Morning journal and courier., 1893-05-19
Early Days on New York Central.
An Old Railroad Mans "reminiscences I'm tn


New York sun.l
'T worked at the building of what is
now q portion of the New York Central
railroad As years ago, and don't believe
there was ever In the history of railroad
building in this country such a struggle
between people living along the line of
road and the company building 1t as there
was on that road. This was especially the
case In the vicinity of Tribes hill, where cer-
tain property owners refused to sell the
right of way for the road, and the proper
ty had to be taken by the company under
the law of eminent domain. The property
owners, after the route for the road had
been fixed by the process of law, hsrrassed
the workmen in various ways while the
road bed was being graded and the track
laid. Whole sections of embankment of
grade would be destroyed by them In q
single night, and rails torn up almost as
fast rs they could be put down. The work
had to be completed at last under Q strong
guard of special oonstables.
CATER the road was finished In that
locality Il was supposed that the persistent
opposition to me work would cease, but
the first train that attempted to run
through that hostile neighborhood ran in
to pile of heavy logs and other obstruc-
tions, and the engineer and several passen-
gers were severely injured That was un-
doubtedly the first successful attempt at
train wreoking in this country. There was
no doubt In the mind of any one who the
perpetrators of the outrage were-snd some
of them were men of q great deal of con.
sequence In those dsys-but no one was ar
rested.
The engineer of the next train that ran
on that part of the road was on the look
out for trouble, and discovered pile of
cordwood on the track. 1t took him and
the rest of the trainmen an hour to throw
the wood clear of the rail so the trains
could proceed. They had only gone few
rods when, on rounding q curve. the en-
gineer and hremen ssw an immense stack
of straw on the track. Suspecting that
something more formidable than straw was
hidden by the stack, the trsinmen tore 1t
to pisces and scattered the straw, but found
no other obstruction. During the work of
removing the stack though, the men and
the train were asssiled by showers of stones
and clubs from the bushes and high banks
on either side of the road.
Several days after that, the train found
straw stack after straw stack piled on the
rails, and each time the engineer would
bring 1t to a stop for fear that more solid
and dangerous obstacles were inside Of the
straw. After a score of these stacks were
torn apart and no dangerous distractions
found concealed in them, the engine
was kept moving and made to scat
ter the straw without stopping the
train. This bunting of the stacks down
with the engine was at frat done with eau
tion and by running 1t slow. By aud by,
however, the engineer put aside hfs caution
and went whizzing through the stacks
without slscking the speed of his train.
This was probably what the opponents of
the road were looking for. At any rate,
one day the engineer rushed his locomotive
against a large straw stack and instantly
found himself In disastrous wreck. The
engine was rolled down the bank and two
cars badly smashed. The fireman wss
seriously hurt, but the engineer mirscu-
lously escaped with few scratches. Sew
eral of the passengers were hurt, That
straw stack was simply thin covering to
a pile of huge stones which the farmers
had rolled upon the track
'fFor weeks the track continued to be
strewn with ohstructions of various kinds,
and with each train men were carried
whose duty 1t was to clear the track OF these
obstacles. After time these enemies of
the road became more bold, and adopted q
novel plan of obstructing and delaying the
evening train thst ran west. To carry out
this plan a number of the farmers broke
into a shed where the cars are housed and
stole a hand car from the company. This
they loaded with big stones and ran il in
to the curve at Tribes hill, where they
waited the coming of the train. When the
train came sloDg the men on the hand car
dumped several big stones out on the
track. This brought the train to stand
still, and the gang on The hand car started
on. The car was run on q lew hundred
feet where 1t was stopped sss'n. When the
men on the train cleared the stonss from
the track, and the train started abe ead. it
soon came in sight of the hand car again
when The gang dumped more stones on
the track and went on. Aud sn for miirs
the train was harrasssd in lite progress,
causing hours of delay.