San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1893-05-10
The Daily Eight.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 10, 1898
A THRILLING EXPERIENCE.
How it Feels to be in a First-class
Cyclone.

known by the boys under
the sOubriquet of " Windy "
has earned title that he had
acquired before he deserved it, but
now can carry his pseudOnym I'M
disputed wherever he goes. He
arrived yesterday right out OF
first-class cyclone and was given an
opportunity by a reporter for the
LIGHT to tell his experience, which
he did after this style, and with
these preliminary remarks and in
PRODUCTION:
"Well, YOU see just got in today
from a very eventful trip. would
have been in a heap sooner if the
cyclone had carried me further and
Fred Rogers had not stopped me at
Waco. You see Waco is a fine city.
tits the second-best city in Texas,
San Antonio coming first, of course.
Waco is a live, bustling, wide
awake, active city and has to jump
into her hot sulphur water baths
every day, and some times three
times a day, to cool her down, as
the temperature of her business is
so much higher than that OF her
arteSian water.
"Well, but how about the cyclone
YOU started to tell about" the re-
porter interjaculated.
"Oh, the cyclone: Why have you
ever been in one: | mean a real
first class cyclone
Being answered by the reporter
that the nearest approach to one
he was ever in was last city cleo
ton that he carried for the I'M
grateful winners, Mr.. HOugh con-
tinued thus: "Well you see the
wind was going at the rate of more
than 300 miles minute or an hour
| don't remember which, because
| didn't have time to look at
wind guage and | didn't have
one with me, but was told so by
man who had been signal SER
vice observer before they hired him
as a drummer to sell balloons to
rainmakers, RrOnauts and other
ballOOnaticS. We were on pas
senger train which was fifteen
minutes late when the cyclone,
which was travelling in the same
direction as the train for some dis
lance, struck the Pullman coach.
The instant that the cyclone
hit her it knocked the train so far
that we had passed station and
not only made up the lost time but
gained twenty minutes for refresh
ments that we didn't have time to
take. Well that cyclone behaved
better than cyclones usually do.
1t did not pick the cars up off the
track and scatter them all over
the prairie as we expected it
to do. 1t Just gave pointer or
two to the locomotive and engineer
as we'll as the passengers as to
what speed really is. 1t took
contract to prOpell that train faster
than any train in the world ever
run and carried out the contract
over the protest of the engineer
who was on the railway lOcOmO-
tive. 1t makes my head swim
even now to think of it. Give me
some apOlinaris. You see the en-
gineer reversed the lever and
threw sand out in front and fire
behind but that did no good. He
put on the air brakes and they
clamped down as close as a spOOny
couple but the cyclone kept carry
ing the train along until the fric-
ton on the wheels burnt out the
bottoms of the water coolers and
made sCalding steam in the refrig-
ratOr under the Pullman.
We were going at the rate of
two hundred and fifty miles an
hour when the works in the con-
ductOr's watch melted and then he
was unable to take any account o.
time. The cyclone then took a
tangent and circled to the left and
we stopped within about fifteen
miles from where we parted from
it and when we started out again
with the engine only to pull us we
all thought that it was taking a
week to come into the next station,
although the engineer was giving
her sixty mile a minute speed for
fear that another cyclone might
hit u.s."
"Well how far did that cyclone
carry you.?"
ooh, ] don't know. You see it
took us by so many stations that
we lost track of them and as we
had no chance to report or wait for
orders, we got into Waco be-
fore we knew where we were. None
of us had a map with us to tell us
where we were, and if we had it