Submitted by: Dan Rich

William P. Bryson

1855 – Aug. 1, 1931

South Bend Tribune, Sunday, August 2, 1931, (excerpted)

Three persons, one of them a prominent Mishawakan, were killed and five others injured in traffic accidents late Saturday in the vicinity of South Bend. The dead are:

William P. Bryson, age 76, 223 Lincoln Way West, Mishawaka.

Mr. Bryson, one-time secretary of the Perkins Windmill company in Mishawaka and one of the best known men of early Mishawaka, was instantly killed Saturday afternoon when his light coupe was demolished two miles north of Mishawaka by a west-bound Grand Trunk passenger train.

Mrs. Bryson, who has been blind for several years, was informed of her husband's death by a relative more than an hour after the accident occurred. At the time of the crash, Mr. Bryson was driving south on Fir road, en route home from Eagle lake, Michigan, where he had gone Saturday morning.

Witnesses said that he was traveling slowly but apparently failed to see the train approaching. His car was hurled more than 200 feet west of the crossing and into a deep ditch. The track is visible hundreds of yards in both directions from the crossing.

Mr. Bryson had been employed for the last year by the Fire Prevention Engineers, 126 Lincoln Way West. He was born in 1855 in Elkhart county, Ind., and went to Mishawaka from Michigan City while a young man. He married Miss May Eggleston in Mishawaka in 1871.

Besides his widow he is survived by three children, Mrs. Fred Hertz, of Asbury, N. J., LaVerne Bryson, of Honolulu, and C. E. Bryson, of Los Angeles, Calif., and by one brother, Frank, of Elkhart.

South Bend Tribune

Monday, August 3, 1931)

William P. Bryson, age 75, of 223 Lincoln Way East, killed Saturday afternoon by a west bound Grand Trunk Western passenger train at the Fir road crossing, was at one time secretary-treasurer of the Perkins Windmill company, the largest plant of its kind at the time in the world. The picture was taken about 25 years ago and is a good likeness of Mr. Bryson, as he retained his youthful appearance. Mr. Bryson was one of the city's best-known men. Funeral arrangements are not complete.