Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1888-07-20
FREIGHT BRAKEMEN.
THE MANY HARDSHIPS OF THEIR
WORK IN COLD WEATHER.

OF Danger.
On one Of the very coolest and storT,iest
days OF the past winter l was in the Office OF
Pennsylvania railroad official overlooking
vast yard of endless switches and sidings,
over which shifting trains and locomotives
were moving like so many huge shuttles A
rugged looking young man, wearing cap, a
rusty blue ree.ing jacket, blue flannel shirt,
and baggy trousers stuffed in high rubber
boots, entered the Office. took off his cap, and
as soon as he could get his breath thus adj
dressed the official:
Il want to leave my name for the job o
brakln' Oh freight train so. Jimmy Riley
out OF it, He just got cut in two up in the
yard. The train was comm in purity lively,
an the cars was icy on top. The engineer
whistled for brakes an Jimmy started to run
over the top O the train. He slipped an fell
betwixt two cars. He hit on the bumper an
grabbed to save himself, but he couldn't
ketch nothin', an dropped on to the rail
Both trucks went over him. lie an another
Teller was there, an we started for here as
fast as we could get to ask for Jimmy's
place. l got here first, an I'd like the job
first rate, if you could give it to me, sir9'
The railroad Official promised to hold the
application for consideration, and the man
went out, evidently well pleased.
There is no calling" said the official when
the man had gone, $50 beset with danger and
hardships as that of railroad brakeman,
especially on long freight trains; and yet, if
| there should be twenty brakemen killed on
this or any other road to-day there would be
as many applicants for each mans place as
| soon as the news of his death became known,
The man who was just here was an eye wit
ness OF Riley's frightful death, and yet what
ever impression it made upon him was lost in
| appreciation of the fact that the dead man
had left place to be filled by some one else.
This prompted him to act at once, and he lost
not second in securing all the advantage
priority of application might give him.
INTO DEAD MEMS SHOES.
Every railroad has hanging about its
yards and stations small army of these
anxious applicants for chances to step into
dead mems shoes. They are chiefly men who
have followed railroading all their lives, and
who have lost their jobs for some cause
Railroadlng is q good deal ike politics. If
man gets into it once he isn't worth q snap
for anything else. And so if he gets cut of
1t he Is constantly on the lookout for the op-
portunity that he believes must come to let
him in again. There isn't one among this
class OF men refer to who does not feel gem
ulne sorrow when railroad man is killed
and not one Of them would hesitate to risk
his own life to save that Of any trainnan in
danger, although he might be sure that the
death OF that man would give him long
hoped for place on the rOad yet they haunt
the tracks and the station yards day after
day, watching the switching and coming and
going of trains, knowing that sooner or later
some one of the men on those trains is bound
20 be killed or manned into helplessness. It
seems that there were only two of these men
near to witness tho shocking oeath of Riley
today, and when others hear of it and that
an application for Riley's place was put in
an hour or SO ahead OF them they will bemoan
the hard luck that had kept them from beiEg
present when the accident occurred and
robbed them OF an equal chance in reaching
my ear first. 1t is by no means likely that
the young man who was just here will be
hired, although he may. II he isn't given
Rileys place it Will not break his faith nor
that of any OF his kind in the Importance of
having early intelligence OK fatal accidents to
tralnmen and OF being early in my office with
the news and an application, or, If the acct
dent occurs somewhere else, at the Office Of
the one in authority there"
l walked through the railroad yard and to
the spot where poor Jimmy Riley was killed
His manged body had been taken away. \
grimy, one armed switchman pointed out to
me where the unfortunate brakeman fell on
the rail- and explained how it all happened.
TIE TOP NOTCH OF DANGER
hoe hoe, LorI -i1,to y ~.
the switchman. Jimmy makes four this
week, SO far. Three of 'em was took just like
him, and t'other I'm was fattened 'twixt the
bumpers while ne was couplin'. l couldn't
tell you how many has been caught up along
this line, but I've been noticin' that there's a
good many strange brakemen on some O. the
trains that comes in. There's five fellows in
three gangs alone that l don't know l
haven't had the heart to ask where the old
hands are, for s'pose I'd be told that this
one had been knocked off his car by bridge,
an that one had missed a couplin' an got the
bumpers, an that another one had slipped
from the roof, like Jimmy jist now, an SO on
1t may be, though that some Of them are
only laid up with a few fingers of, or an arm
twisted out OF the socket, or a foot run over
and smashed, or some little thing like that
hope so, anyhow.
What makes bradn' so dangerousl A
good many things. For instance, there's
couplin'. That's always at the top notch OF
dangerous from one New Years to another,
every day in the year, year in an year out
Just now the ice an snow on the cars is dan |
gerous 1t isn't an easy thing for man to |
run along the tops of cars going twenty |
miles an hour, even when there is no ice on |
the boards an the wind is light. But when |
you take it Ike it has been for week or 50,
with the car roofs like glass and the wind !
tearing along faster than the train does, l |
want you to know that there's got to be |
nerve in man for him to climb up to the /
top of a car and run over half dozen or so |
every time the engineer calls for brakes |
Then, mind you, brakeman has 10 right to |
ride anywhere but on his car, no matter if |
the snow is falling on him By the ton or rain /
drenching him or hail a-pelting him ike hot |
shot. Then he's apt in the night to run his |
head against some bridge that spans the |
track. But couplin is what carries the most
of them away used to be q freight brake
man myself, and one day l stepped between
two cars to couple them, having at the time
two as good arms as anybody ever had
When came to my senses my right arm
was gone The bumpers took 1t off. These
link and pin couplers are what ruins the
boys. Every brakeman knows that Just for
having to do that be has 70 pay six times as
much for insuring his life as the man that
sets in q warm Office and makes out the train
way bills dos. Then brake chains are apt
TO part, too, when the brakeman is twisting
Isc Il hA f,-ac I