~5-25-04~ Well....

i thought i was going to go on and on about something, but i got up and actually did dishes and stuff, so i forgot....

Trish, i found this site and thought of you, well, and me!

Kelly, how long did it take you to "get" your soldier from angels n camouflage?? i still haven't heard anything back yet.

this is a sad story, but it just shows how small the world is....well here is the story from our newspaper, the repository, i'll explain after.

~Worker dies after fall from city truck
Tuesday, May 25, 2004 By JAN H. KENNEDY Repository staff writer



CANTON — Today is Jake Milbrodt’s third birthday, but there will be no party. Tragedy has removed any chance of celebration for the youngster, whose father, Peter J. Milbrodt, died in a traffic accident Monday morning at Tuscarawas Street E and Riverside Road.

Milbrodt, 32, an employee of the city’s Signal Department, was pronounced dead at Aultman Hospital at 10:41 a.m., 35 minutes after the accident, according to a police report. He was knocked from his bucket truck when a dump truck struck the raised bucket, with Milbrodt inside, as he prepared to repair a traffic signal at the intersection.

The death came as a shock to his boss, Steve Bryan, a traffic engineer and head of the Signal Department.

“This is hard to believe,” he said. “He was a very good worker, a good employee.”

Bryan said Milbrodt and fellow employee Ryan Boron went to the intersection to repair the traffic signal. Milbrodt had entered the bucket and was going up. Boron was in the truck doing paperwork, Bryan said.

“We had cones out, and all the safety measures were in place,” he said.

Police said a Mack Econodyne dump truck, driven by Robert D. Martz, 64, of Easton Street NE in Nimishillen Township was eastbound on Tuscarawas Street and struck the raised bucket, ejecting Milbrodt.

He was transported to Aultman by Canton Fire Department personnel. If ruled a traffic fatality by the Stark County coroner, Milbrodt’s death would be the fourth in the city this year. No charges had been filed as of Monday night, but the accident remains under investigation.

Milbrodt had been with the Signal Department about two years, Bryan said. He previously worked for the Water Pollution Control Department.

Prior to Monday night’s meeting, City Council paused for a moment of silence in memory of Milbrodt.

Mayor Janet Weir Creighton expressed sorrow for the loss of the seven-year city employee.

“No city employee wakes up in the morning with the thought they’re not coming home at night,” she said after the meeting. “Here you have a young man with a wife and three small boys. He kissed his family before he left this morning, and he’s never coming back home. Your life changes in a second.”

Creighton and other city officials visited Milbrodt’s wife, Melanie, Monday at the hospital.

“We’ll cooperate with the investigation,” the mayor said of the accident, “but right now our thoughts are with the family.”

Milbrodt and his wife have three children — Caleb, 7, Jake, 3, and Jared, 1.

Today is Jake’s birthday, but, “his daddy won’t be there for him,” said Helen Milbrodt, Pete’s mother.

She said her son’s “favorite thing in life was wrestling with his boys.”

Milbrodt was a wrestler and football player for Timken High School. He graduated in 1990, then graduated from the Pittsburgh School of Art in 1992, majoring in commercial art.

“He can draw freehand real well, but he never liked doing art on a computer,” said his father, Don Milbrodt, an employee in the city’s accounting department.

Peter Milbrodt joined the city’s Water Pollution Control Department in October of 1997. Two years ago, he bid on and received a job with the signal shop. Bryan, his boss, remembers he always had magazines on woodworking and carpentry.

“He was a real handyman,” his mother said. “Carpentry, plumbing, woodworking, engines.”

“If anything went wrong, he’d find a book and learn how to fix it,” his father said.

Milbrodt golfed in the city’s golf league and liked to ride his motorcycle. He also was in a bowling league.

“We were waiting on a ring from the American Bowling Congress for bowling a 298 game this year,” his wife said. “Now, he’ll never get to see it.”

Funeral arrangements are pending at the Reed Funeral Home. In addition to his immediate family, he is survived by his maternal grandmother, Wilma June Fisher of Massillon; paternal grandfather, Russell Milbrodt of Perry Township; sister and brother-in-law Julia and Jack Underwood; and his wife’s grandfather, Michael Berkmyer of Canton.

Repository writer Ed Balint contributed to this report.

You can reach Repository writer Jan H. Kennedy at (330) 580-8325 or e-mail:

jan.kennedy@cantonrep.com~

my cousin's husband was friends Peter. she was telling me the story of what happened. she said they came home that day and got the message of what happened. well, later that night her husbands father called and said that he was in a accident today, his truck hit a bucket truck and the guy died!!!!!! how small of a world is that!!!! that is just so awful on so many different levels! i mean how is gregg, my cousins husband, going to feel talking to peter's wife, also his friend, when he knows that his father is the person who "killed" him! it is just a sad, sad situation.

not mentioned in the story is that, supposedly the guy who was in the truck was supposed to be outside directing traffic. but he was in the truck. that is why so far bob isn't charged with anything. i just don't get why the bucket would have been hanging low enough that a truck could strike it. you would think if that was the case they wouldn't allow any traffic to pass. i guess it is just one of those freak things, that you just don't understand why it happens!!!! my heart goes out to the family!