Photograph of George Bissell on horseback
At about 9:00 A.M., eighty-one-year-old Detroit businessman George W. Bissell was guiding his horse-drawn carriage down Brooklyn Avenue when an automobile “scorched” by. The horses became frightened and jumped, causing one of the carriage’s wheels to fall off. Bissell was pitched forward, striking his head on the pavement. He was pronounced dead of a fractured skull at 11:15 A.M.
Source : Michigan Historical Calendar, courtesy of the Clarke Historical Library at Central Michigan University.
For a related article, see Richard Bak Detroit’s Ride from Horse to Horsepower”, Hour Detroit, January 2012.