Omaha Time Capsule: Caretaker dies in fall from bridge

What happened in the Midlands on this day? Here's a sampling from the World-Herald archives.

PARK CARETAKER DIES IN FALL FROM BRIDGE

1935: A 30-foot fall from the Burlington railroad bridge, 38th Street and Dahlman Boulevard, proved fatal for an Omaha man, who for more than a decade was caretaker of the Western league baseball park. The man suffered a fractured skull when he fell and was taken to Lord Lister hospital. He was first noticed hanging by his hands from the side of the bridge. Two boys playing nearby notified police, but by the time they arrived he had fallen. At the hospital, the caretaker was unable to explain to officers why he happened to be on the bridge or how he fell.

1996: The Bellevue Police Department ordered seven special video cameras for its cruisers thanks to an $11,000 donation through the James B. Wilson Memorial Foundation, said S.P. Benson, Bellevue city administrator. The money was raised during a telethon in December. The telethon raised money for equipment to promote officer safety and was prompted by the Aug. 20 shooting death of Omaha Police Officer Jimmy Wilson Jr. during a routine traffic stop. Nearly $100,000 was raised during the three-hour telethon. Of that, about $11,000 was earmarked for the Bellevue department. The Bellevue Rotary donated $4,500, and students and staff at Logan Fontenelle Middle School contributed $1,000, Benson said. Each camera costs nearly $4,000, a sum Benson said the city couldn't have afforded on its own. The cameras were being bought with the help of a grant through the Nebraska Office of Highway Safety.

2006: Southwest Omaha residents challenged city engineers not only to widen portions of Q Street and 168th Street, but also to make them safer. The booming section of the metro area had seen rapidly increasing traffic on two-lane roads, and the engineers were scrambling to deal with that problem. The $5 million widening project would take place in two phases, one starting in June and the other in the next year, after the first is substantially done. The first would widen Q Street from west of 156th Street to 165th Street. The second would widen Q Street to 170th Street, and 168th Street from P to S Streets.

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