Dead Page

From time to time, I come across the obituaries of people who I believe have had an impact on America, or have led interesting lives. While I was a teacher, I had my kids to a current events page. Very often, it would include obituaries, so often, in fact, that theycame to call the Current Events page the Dead Page which is why I continue the name here.


CARL E. THORKELSON 1921-2007

His forklift design averted back woes. Businessman had a knack for refitting machines to move heavy objects

Nov. 13th Chicago Tribune. By Patricia Trebe.

Carl Thorkelson died Nov. 10th in Oak Brook.

He was always thinking of new ways to move things. During WWII, he enlisted in the Army Air Force because he wanted to fly. He flew B-17 bombers in the 8th Air Force with the 100th Bomb Group which came to be known as the Bloody 100 because of their heavy losses.

After the war, he got his degree at the University of Chicago.

He was involved in several businesses, and invented the Thork-Lift, a machine that lifts heavy material from the floor to waist height.

I always thought they were called fork-lifts.


HERBERT SAFFIR 1917-2007

Measurer of hurricanes. Structural Engineer created 5-category system used to classify storm strengths.

Associated Press. In Nov. 24th Chicago Tribune

Herbert Saffir died November 21st at age 90.

A structural engineer who, in 1969, created a scale for the first time to determine the potential damage from approaching hurricanes. Since then, this has been the way all hurricanes are classified. Categories went from 1, where trees and unanchored mobile homes get the most damage to Category 5, the worst damage.

In the 1970s, it was expanded byNational Hurricane director Robert Simpson and became known as the Saffir-Simpson scale.

So, next hurricane season, when you see the poor Weather Channel folks standing out in the wind and rain and say Category 2 or 3, you'll know where it came from.