LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (KTHV) - In 1932, elevators weren't automatic. They had operators.
During lunch hour on June 17, a man named Ira Gurley - who many expected to run for Secretary of State - watched the elevator reach him on the third floor.
Capitol historian David Ware explained what happened next.
"Then he steps on, but then the elevator operator hadn't noticed that Gurley was stepping on," Ware said. "So he had started shutting the gate and the elevator was moving up, so he was crushed by the floor of the elevator and the top of the doorframe."
Ira Gurley from Carroll County left behind a wife and two daughters.
But, what may be surprising is that this tragic incident is linked to the popular Cosmopolitan magazine.
It turns out that Ira Gurley was the father of Helen Gurley Brown, the woman who wrote Sex and the Single Girl in 1962. In 1965, she became managing editor of Cosmopolitan "Cosmo," and by doing so, she changed the culture of women in America.
A woman, who was only 10 years old when her father died at the Arkansas State Capitol, went on to make a lasting impression on the culture of America.
