Let Us All Enjoy Accident Reports!

Once upon a time, in the basement of the P.S. 61 building, a pile of boring-looking file folders sat unnoticed for decades. When I lugged them upstairs, I discovered amazing treasures within. These folders contain accident reports from the 1940s and 50s, records of the ordinary cuts and scrapes experienced by children (and a few adults) in and near the school building. From Robert, who threw a book at John (who “reciprocated,” in the language of the report), to Kathleen, who jumped down several steps just to show she could jump farther than Ronald, the sometimes ridiculously dry language of the accident reports has nonetheless riveted my students (and me too). Some of the accidents sounds like they could happen today (like Kathleen’s jump), while others involve inkwells and beanshooters and class trips to the horrific-sounding Guggenheim Dental Clinic. We wondered whether some of these “accidents” should really be classified as such, too!

We have so many of these reports. In my dreams, someone offers to digitize all of them. Here are a few, starting with Nicholas. The moral of this story is “Don’t tell Lenny that it’s a half day.”

Now we have the simple, classic tale of Joseph.

You will learn another important life lesson from Michael: Do not handle the door improperly.

Here’s another Nicholas, this one with badly worn shoes.

And finally Vincent, from whom we can learn to never run away from our grandmothers!

I’d love to read any comments, and if these are as interesting for you to read as they have been for me and my students, I’ll happily post more.