Off Pigeon Point

Little Hollis Pifer, 6, and his mother started on a trip one evening last week. At San Francisco they boarded the S. S. San Juan. Next night, Hollis's mother told him, they would be in Los Angeles.

Long after little Hollis and his mother went to bed, as the ship's bell struck midnight, they were all but thrown from their berths by a lurch of the vessel. Half awake, the child could hear screams, shrieks, the anguished cries of the humans in great peril. Quickly his mother bundled him in her arms, rushed him through a fear-tormented mob to the deck. Stars had disappeared. On the foggy deck, indistinct figures ran about, cursing and praying for life preservers.

Hollis Pifer remembers his mother taking him to the railing, calling, "Save my child." He remembers being thrown into the arms of a sailor aboard another noisier, dirtier boat, watching wide-eyed as the San Juan sank, while horror-stricken passengers and crew swam about in oily water. "Oh, grandma," said little Hollis next day in San Francisco, "the ship sank. It was fun!"

Sixteen miles off Pigeon Point, Cal., the San Juan, 2,000 tons, 47 years old, had been rammed by the Standard Oil tanker 5. C. T. Dodd. Of no passengers and crew, only 42 were saved. Next day grim men sat in the U. S. Steamboat Inspector's office at San Francisco. All agreed that: 1) There was dense fog. 2) The Dodd rammed the San Juan amidships. 3) The San Juan sank in ten minutes. Beyond that there was no agreement. One said no lifeboats were lowered from the San Juan. Another said there were. "The crew was cowardly," blurted an angry survivor. Capt. H. O. Bleumchen of the Dodd testified: "The San Juan cut right across our path. Then I heard her three bells [reverse signal]. If she had gone on, there'd have been no crash."

No testimony could the captain of the San Juan give. He, Capt. Adolph F. Asplund, grizzled 65-year-old sea dog, had gone down with his ship. Strangely, it had been a "friendship" voyage for him. For three years retired, he had accommodated a brother captain desirous of a vacation.

Despite disagreement and meagre proof of responsibility, the Los Angeles-San Francisco Navigation Co., owners of the San Juan, were quick to file two suits against Standard Oil Co. of California, totaling $1,800,000. Their charge: "Excessive rate of speed in a fog, without keeping the proper lookout or sounding the proper fog signal."