The rumor, perpetuated by generations of Illinois schoolchildren, is that elephants killed in a train wreck couldn't be moved and were buried where they fell.
Forest Park is a town of cemeteries, marking the historical fringe of the metropolitan area.
While strip malls and fast food have crept in, endless fields of monuments still silently greet the Forest Park visitor. The train was halted on the Michigan Central tracks near Ivanhoe due to an overheated axle box. A troop train suddenly appeared on the same track, cruising up from behind at 35mph and failing to heed track warning signals and flares. Engineer Alonzo Sargent snoozed his way through three cars, finally halting on top of the fourth in a deafening grinding of metal and splintering of wood. Most of the 86 perished in the first 35 seconds of the wreck.