GAMBLING WITH DEATH.
WORLD'S "MOST RISKY" JOB. MAN REFUSES TO GIVE IT UP. The man with the most risky job in the world," Mr. Tex Thornton, is planning to visit England in the near future because, ho says, he has a longing to see the old world before he sees the nest world. Mr. Thornton is a professional oil well shooter—that is, he gains a hazardous living by starting oil wells by the use of high explosive shells or extinguishing oil fires by " blowing them out" with nitro-glycerine. A recent oil well fire in Texas illustrates Mr. Thornton's extraordinarily risky job. He donned his asbestos, suit, and crawled out toward the spouting inferno. In front of him he pushed two asbestos tubes containing enough explosive to annihilate a town. When he got within rango he placed the explosive shells so that when thoy exploded they would blow out the column of blazing gas from the oil. Then he rati back and waited fo r the heat to fire the explosive. "I've been following this trade £pr years," Mr. Thornton said lately. 'Tvo had some amazingly narrow escapes. But the job appeals to me, and I shall go on doing it until—well, until I get what s coming to me sooner or later."
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New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20958, 22 August 1931, Page 2 (Supplement)
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212GAMBLING WITH DEATH. New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20958, 22 August 1931, Page 2 (Supplement)
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