Fountain City, IN Private Plane Crashes, Apr 1962

PLANE BREAKS IN AIR; FOUR FALL TO DEATH.

Fountain City, Ind. (UPI) -- Four persons fell 1,000 feet to their deaths Sunday when a single-engined plane came apart in the air, dropping the occupants free of the wreckage to a field below.
Witnesses told police the plane emerged from a cloudbank, dropped down and then apparently hit turbulent air.
They said a wing broke off, the tail assembly came apart and the motor was torn loose.
The bodies fell from the plane one by one and landed on the farm of MRS. J. C. MARTIN about a half a mile from where the fuselage crashed. The accident happened a mile southeast of here.
The victims were identified as CARL DEHMER, JR., 36, and his wife, VIRGINIA, 35, of Wichita, Kans., and RICHARD H. IVERS, 35, and his wife, GRACE, 34, Sapulpa, Okla.
Police said DEHMER owned the plane, but it could not be determined if he was the pilot.
IVERS recently was elected Sapulpa city commissioner and was to have taken office May 7.
Police said that according to a flight plan, the four were on a flight from Ohio State University at Columbus, Ohio, to Springfield, Mo.
GEORGE BERRY, an area resident, said the plane "gunned its engine a few times and then died." He said he heard the crash a few minutes later.
VERNARD GROSS said he heard a noise in the clouds "like a plane doing acrobatics." He said he looked up to see a wing fall off the plane, followed by the bodies. Police said none of the victims had parachutes.
Authorities said the bodies struck earth so hard they left impressions on the ground.
The engine of the plane was partly buried in the earth not far from the bodies. The fuselage and other parts of the craft landed about 2,000 feet away on the RAY SWAIN farm adjoining the MARTIN residence.
DEHMER was identified as a Wichita businessman, and IVERS was head of IVERS Engineering Co. in Sapulpa. The firm builds grain elevators.

Logansport Pharos-Tribune Indiana 1962-04-30
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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!