Robert Franklin Davis, 45, of Adair, died as a result of head injuries he received when a concrete wall collapsed inside a building at Watson Seed Farms near Macomb Thursday morning, Nov. 20, 1975. The wall separated several grain storage bins.
He was buried underneath the wall and shelled corn. Officials said he was in the walkway beside the wall transferring corn from one bin to another when the wall collapsed at about 11:10 a.m.
Illinois State Police and Macomb Firemen were called to the scene at 11:15 a.m.
State Police, firemen, area farmers, ambulance crewmen several crews of state highway department workers and other volunteers used endloaders and shovels to remove the cement blocks and corn in order to reach the victim.
The body was recovered at about 1:35 p.m. and taken to McDonough District Hospital.
No one else was injured.
The building is located at the west side of the Seed Farm. Between 6,000 and 7,000 bushels of corn were stored in the bins on the east side of the building.
Davis had been an employee of Watson Seed Farms since 1946. The firm is located on Route 136, two miles east of the intersection of Routes 136 and 67.
Mr. Davis was born Sept. 27, 1930, at Brooklyn, the son of James Frank and Bertha Powell Davis. He married Ilene Eicken on Feb. 13, 1949. She survives.
Also surviving are two sons, James and Kevin; two daughters, Beverly and Cheryl, all at home; three brothers, Irvin Davis, Canton, Laurence Davis, Pekin, and Clifford Davis, Avon; one sister, Mrs. Gale (Inez) Hayden of Plymouth; and his mother of Plymouth.
Funeral services were held at 2 p.m. Sunday afternoon at the Adair United Methodist Church with Rev. W. Landers Gutel officiating. Burial was in Forest Lawn Memory Gardens in Macomb.
Current Obituaries in the Astoria South Fulton Argus