N&W in 1910--Occupational hazard

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Bluefield Daily Telegraph
January 28, 1910

FIREMAN WAS MISTAKEN FOR A BURGLAR
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W. M. Goff Shot and Probably Fatally Wounded at Norton
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RESTAURANT KEEPER IN WISE COUNTY JAIL
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Went Back to Bed After Firing on Hungry Man Who Had Knocked at Door Bearing Sign, "Meals at All Hours"
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BULLET PIERCED SIDE AND ENTERED INTESTINES
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   Norton, Va., Jan. 27.  (Special)--Michael Fekete, who conducts a restaurant near the Arlington Hotel here, shot and probably fatally wounded W. M. Goff, a fireman on the Norfolk and Western, about three o'clock this morning.
    Goff arrived here on a freight train at 2:40 this morning.  He was hungry, and reading the sign on Fekete's place, "Meals at All Hours," went to the door and tried to enter, but the door was locked.  Fekete, who slept above, head the noise, and just as Goff was turning away raised the window and fired, the ball piercing the right side of the man and entering the intestines.
    An operation was performed this morning by Drs. Carr, Cherry and Hale.  Goff's recovery is much in doubt.  He is a young man about twenty-five years old and is a native of Giles county.  This was his first run into Norton.  He is being cared for at the Mountain View Hotel.
    Fekete, who has been sent to jail at Wise to await trial, which is set for next Saturday a week, claims that he thought his victim was a burglar trying to enter his store.  He fired several times, but only one ball took effect.  Fekete after the shooting went back to bed and, it is said, paid no attention to the affair, thinking that he had shot a burglar.  Goff, who had rapped on the door in trying to awake the proprietor of the restaurant, stepped back into the street when he heard the window open and in that way made a fair mark of himself for the shots which were fired at him.  There was no one on the street at the time the shooting occurred but the noise made by the gun attracted a number of people who soon gathered and found the man suffering from the gun shot wounds.
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Gordon Hamilton
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