Ernest and Ralph Smith
The News-Examiner, 29 January 1915
About 10 o'clock Thursday morning, Jan 21, Ernest and Ralph Smith
broke through the ice, while skating on Bear Lake and narrowly escaped being
drowned. The two young men and Ernest Erickson were skating and when about
a quarter mile from shore, Ernest Erickson sat down to tighten one of his stake
straps.
As he finished buckling the strap he glanced up and saw the two Smith boys struggling in the water. He hurried to their assistance, but soon realized that he could do nothing without a rope or other help, so he skated as fast as he could to shore and secured a blank from the corral of Nephi Williamson. He skated back to the boys, who were able to hold themselves up out of the water. He soon rescued Ralph, but Ernest Smith is quite large and had on a heavy sheepskin lined coat and they were afraid the plank would break. Mr. Erickson made another trip to the shore and goat a rope, but before he had returned to the Smith boys, Ralph had succeeded in getting his brother out of the water.