Thomas County cat., 1890-10-02

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e7NN which write was employed
on the western division of the road,
with headquarters at Michigan City,
Ind. A days work with our crew con-
sisted of the run from this point to
Chicago and return each twenty-four
hours, for which service receiy ed the
muni6cent salary of forty-five dollars a
month. But I was somewhat roman
tically inclined in those younger days
of mine, and the pleasurable excite
ment derived from "a life on the rail"
seemed ample compensation for any
thing in the way of meager pay.
The company owned or operated the
Jackson, Lansing and Saginaw Rail
road. the northern extension Of which
was then in process of construction
through the heart of the vast wilder
ness which stretched, unbroken by
scarce settlement, from Bay City to
the Straits of Mackinaw. A small vii
lage named Welch, some seventy OF
eighty miles north of Bay City, was the
terminus of freight and passenger
traffic, though the line was built con-
siderable distance northward of this
point. The region of country travers-
ed by this road was lonely and desc
late in the extreme. Once in each
eight or ten miles logging camp. with
@store" attachments for the sale Of
lumbermen's supplies, would in man
ner relieve the monotony of the SEEM
ingly endless forest of gigantic pines
which stretched away in the distance
from every point of the compass. It
was the next thing to impossible for
the company to induce men to stay for
any great length of time in this inhos-
pitable desert, despite the triple al
lowance of wages paid. Hot weather
came on, and SO frequent were resig-
nations and desertions from the
Branch" as the road was termed by
us "main-liners," that heroic measures
were resorted to by the company to
re-enforce the depleted force of
Branch" trainmen, and the five men
comprising our crew were, I believe,
the first victims of the following novel
expedient.
We were returning one night from
Chicago to Michigan City, the end of
our run. We were over eight hours
late, owing to a "wash-out" short
distance east of Chicago, which had
delayed all trains on that end of the
line. This, together with the fact that
none of us had slept a wink the pre-
ceding night, combined to make US
feel not only irritable and careless but
sleepy as well.
We approached the junction of the
"Joliet cutoff" at Lake Station at a
moderate rate of speed, came to a full
stop as required, and then proceeded
onward. The road here was a dead
level, and 1 was in the habit of re-
naming in the engine instead of going
back over the train to set the brakes,
as was customary at stopping places
where the road was up or down grade
have always believed the engineer
was asleep during this part of the per-
formance, and that he simply acted
automatically in stopping and starting
that train. You see, he was used to it !;
had, in fact, performed the same iden-
tical act at the same identical spot once
each day for years, and, in his drowsy
condition of mind and body, was
scarcely more animate than the big To-
comotive beneath his feet. Be this as
it may, the fact remains that we crashed
into car of live stock which formed
part of train which had just arrived
from Joliet via the cutoff" I shall
not attempt to depict the scenes of the
next few hours. They were laid amid
splintered cars and broken, twisted
machinery, and set to the music of
kissing steam, dark-blue profanity, and
the frantic believing of manned and
mangled Texas steers. The debris was
finally removed from the track, and an
other engine towed our battered outfit
into Michigan City.
The day following the accident we
were ordered to report in a body to
the Division Superintendent, chronic
old dyspeptic named Moran. We re-
sponded, and not without considerable
anxious speculation as to the fate
awaiting us. After adjusting his
specs" and glaring at each one of US
in turn, he began questioning us as to
the cause of the accident Each ques-
ton and its answer was taken down in
writing by a subordinate, and the in
vestigation consumed the greater part
Of the day. At its close we were dis
missed with the injunction that we re-
port to the Office the following morn
ing. We complied, and were told by
Moran that after careful consideration
of the matter he had concluded that
we were each and all of us guilty of
gross carelessness and negligence. He
then, after berating US for about fifteen
minutes, bade US choose between two
evils: Either discharge from the COM
pany's service or three months at run
ming log train on the Branch"
My partner, the rear brakeman,
chose the former as the more prefera-
ble mode of punishment. The conduc-
tor, engineer. fireman and myself ac-
:epted the latter alternative, and next
lay we we're sent to jackson, thence
20 East Saginaw, where we were placed
in charge of 4 train and started north
ward. Our division extended from
East Saginaw to Welch. and our train
was SO timed that our nights were
spent at the latter place. The hotel(?)
was conducted by q big, double
limited rad-shirfed Canadian namod