The morning call., 1893-11-26

peDedP NO one knew. Get out OF town!
Get to the scene OF the disaster! Money
from the business Office to meet expenses!
Hurried instructions from managing edi-
tors. CORES pondents for out of town
newspapers hurrying in, breathless with
haste, to inquire. between gasps for air.
'@What - is it anyhow" Telephones
jingling. "Yes, yes, these are the edi-
torial rooms. No, can't answer you now.
Central, oh central! what is the matter
with the railroad people? Ah, is that the
train-dispatcher? Yes, train all ready
you say? Thanks"
Cabbies whipping their horses into run.
Vehicles dashing through the streets. A
jerk up al the railroad station. a rush for
the platform. Out into the damp, raw
night dashed an engine hauling single
coaen to be closely followed by another and
similar train.
The newspaper correspondents were
away, rattling forty-fiye miles an hour over
the Pennsylvania Railroad. bound for
somewhere up the country-somewhere in
an adjacent county.
1t had been wet, disagreeable day in
Pittsburg. 1t was Friday, May 81, 1889,
and the flowers that had been laid on SOL
ditrs' graves. in accordance with the
before they nestled in the waving grass.
Managing editors drearily planned lhe
next days paper. There would be the
usual routine of Memorial day services,
the order of exercises, a few of the ad-
dresses and a description of the parade.
The telegraph queries indicated nothing
OF importance abroad. A mlIder, fire,
lynching; the usual rOutine-but nothing
of great moment. 1t would be dull news
paper IN the morning.
short bulletin from the Western Union
and the newspaper awoke, as did the
others in the city. All was excitement
and seeming confusion. Orders issued
Money secured. Trains asked for. Men
gathered IN from restaurant aud work and
hurried away. 1ir ode hour it was over,
and speF5ei. z toward the Conemaugh Val.
r:ere the Dews-gatherers who in the
To-, u LII =; ana on many su bseQuent morn |
ing. lug. would tell the world of the great dis |
aster at ohnsIown.
While the two trains we're rushing |
through the darkness the men on board i
nad, opportunity to ascertain, by asking |
questlDns OF one another. where they
were going and what bad happened. Still
the information was meager, but it was
added to little by little a the cars stopped
for a second or two at stations. and tele-
graph operators 5swled out sentence to
those on the platform.
The first train had been chartered by
the Pitts burg Dispatch and Times and the
United Press. Train 2 had on board
Robert Herbert and Jack Murray of the
Pittsburg Post. James Henry of the Com
mercial Gazette, William COunelley, man
ager of the Pittsburg Office Of the AsSo-
ciated Press, Harry Orr, a telegraph oper-
ator and the Plttsburg cores pondent of
the New York World. Henry was clad in
evening dress and patent leather she's.
He had been taken from some society as
signment. Connelley was also in evening
attire. 1t was found there was no "copy
paper" IN the crowd, so a raid was made
on the conductors order blanks.
bolivar! !" shouted brakeman.
Cant go any further" SAID the conduc-
tor. Tracks washed out ahead and the
other train is stalled as WELL"
Out in the rain hurried the newspaper
men. Lights were f1ickering here and
there, casting grim shadows around. The
roar OIL the swollen Conemaugh could he
heard at hand. but the worst Of the food
h0d passed. However, deep cuts could be
seen in the streets " here the waters had
swept by. Twenty miles away was the
scene OF the disaster. yet the townspeople
had particulars. For some men standing
on one of the bridges and seeing houses
laden with human freight come tearing
down the river had secured rope and as
one mass of debris passed had lassoed a
boy. There the lad was In farmhouse.
shiYering with cold, crying with fright,
Again 10 the newspaper men he told the
awful story. Other information was cleaned
ana III twenty minutes enough facts to fill
column after column were gathered.
But how TO get the news To the papers!
That was puZZling question, for the men
who had taken the first train were al
ready I'D possession of the telegraph office.
Finally plan was evolved, and each man
started In to get his copy" in shape.
Some lay down on the floor of the station,
and wrote by lautern-light; others kneeIed
hG.a Re n arfa 81
halt was called, aDd four different
specials-One to the Associated Press, one
TO the Pittsburg Post, one to the CONNER
cial Gazette and one to the New York
.World-were entrusted to young Murray.
He and Harry Orr, the OPERATOR boarded
the second train, which was then run back
to Blairsville Junction, six miles distant.
There Orr insisted upon the Western
Union operator yielding up his key. and
the first thing the new arrival did was to
*ground the wire from Bolivar TO prevent
the men up there sending anything more,
and then he began rattling off the specials
that Murray had. BE- IL O'CLOCK the news
had reached the offices.
=: That is how the first story of the great
flood was sent out to the world. The COL
umns that appeared here in San Francisco
; on the Saturday morning after the dis
EASTER were based on the disjOinted SEN
tences of the lad who had been lassoed
from that bridge at Bolivar, and upon
!; interviews secured from trainmen and
people who had seen wreckage pass; for
not newspaper man reached Johnstown
that night-indeed those nearest were
: twenty miles away.
: When Murray and Orr had left for
Baalrsvlile the otner men looked about for
something to eat and for conveyances to
start over the NILS. for the trainmen had
positively refused to try to push ON any
Inrther that night. BY 70 O'Clock
aa laamea wlle mad prepared steaming
wagon and one saddehorse. A half-hour
later the start was made. Just before
leaving one of the men went down to the
telegraph Office and learned that Orr's
scheme hac been carried out successfulIv
The correspondents who had arrived by |
the first train were gathered about the ons |
little telegraph instrument and the ope-
rator was nearly frantic trying to find Out
why he could get no answer. or course |
they had no idea that their wire was
grounded. Each moment they expected to |
have connection sre-esta blished, and SO |
they decided to stay at Bolivar. That Is |