SMITH, BERRY

Posted by Cathy Gowdy on Saturday, April 02, 2011 at 05:35:42 :

Independent Journal
Tuesday, July 21, 1959
Page 4

Accident Victim Rites Thursday

Private funeral services for Gerrold J. Smith, San Anselmo tree surgeon killed Sunday in an automobile accident on Highway 101, will be held Thursday at 11 a.m. at Keaton’s Mortuary in San Rafael.

A native of California, Smith is survived by his two children Danny Joseph and Deborah Ann; five sisters, Janet, Alice, Sandra and Deborah Lynn Smith, and Mrs. Sylvia Berry; and his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Smith.

Smith, who lived at 66 Forrest avenue, was employed by a Sausalito tree service.

He was killed when his pickup truck swerved across the highway near Marin City and was struck by an oncoming sedan.

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Independent Journal
Monday, July 20, 1959
Page 1

S.F. Woman, Marin Man Die In Mishaps On Highway 101
Car Plunges 30 Feet; Truck, Auto Collide

The director of nurses at San Francisco General Hospital and a 23-year-old San Anselmo tree surgeon were killed yesterday in two Highway 101 traffic accidents, bringing Marin County’s highway death toll to 13 this year.

There had been 12 traffic fatalities in Marin at this time last year.

Mrs. Dorothy Lynge Offenbach, 42, head nurse at San Francisco General Hospital and a resident at 221 Vidal drive in San Francisco’s Park Merced, died after her car plunged 30 feet from Highway 101 to a Corte Madera railroad underpass.

Gerald Joseph Michael Smith, 23, who had worked for a Sausalito tree service and lived at 66 Forest avenue, San Anselmo, was killed when his pickup truck swerved across Highway 101 near Marin City and collided with an oncoming sedan.

Mrs. Offenbach suffered fatal injuries in a 12:05 p.m. accident yesterday in which her 16-year-old son, Mark, suffered a head injury. He was reported in “fairly good” condition today at Marin General Hospital.

Mrs. Offenbach’s northbound car came to the top of a rise south of the Greenbrae bridge. She saw stopped cars ahead and applied her brakes, said California Highway Patrol Officer Ray Kirner, who was southbound on a motorcycle.

As the motorcycle patrolman passed, he looked in his rearview mirror and say the Offenbach car skid out of control and go across the center divider. It continued across three southbound lanes and nose-dived through a guard railing and down 30 feet, landing on its top.

Mrs. Offenbach’s son was removed from the demolished car without difficulty, but the vehicle had to be turned on its right side to extricate the woman. She was pronounced dead on arrival at Marin General Hospital.

Mrs. Offenbach had been director of nurses at San Francisco General Hospital since 1952. She was the divorced wife of Dr. Chester Offenbach, a San Francisco dentist. She is survived by a daughter, Lynge of San Francisco, and her mother and a sister in San Jose. Her body was taken to the Russell and Gooch funeral chapel in Mill Valley.

In a 7:30 p.m. accident opposite Marin City, young Smith was killed instantly when the 1959 Ford pickup truck he was driving zig-zagged crazily in the northbound lanes of Highway 101, jumped the center divider strip and flipped onto its right side, the CHP reported.

The truck cab was crushed when struck by a southbound car driven by Dicie Jane Gates, 35, of San Francisco, which in turn was struck in the rear by a third vehicle driven by Joseph J. Castle, 51, of San Francisco.

Mrs. Gates suffered a broken right leg and scalp cuts. She was admitted to marin General Hospital where she was reported in “good” condition today.

Also taken by ambulance to Marin General and later released were Castle, with minor injuries, and passengers in the Gates car – Alice Scanlon, 28, broken right wrist; Mary Alexander, 29, back injuries; Audrey Mullins, 28, scalp lacerations, and Theodore Pacchetti, 32, lacerations of the right hand. All are of San Francisco.

Sausalito police said they believe Smith was the same man, who minutes earlier, had been seen to drive into a stairway leading to the residence of Norman Davis at 1731 Bridgeway boulevard, and then sped off without stopping. A description of that vehicle given by witnesses matched that of the demolished pickup in which Smith was killed.

The truck entered Highway 101 from Bridgeway boulevard, highway patrolmen reported.

Smith’s body was taken to Keaton’s Mortuary in San Rafael. He is survived by his parents, Joseph and Alice Smith, and by four sisters.