Birmingham age-herald., 1895-09-23
SAVED A COLLISION.
AN ENelNEER's STORY OF A CAPRI
 cloUs LOCOMOTIVE.
She Refused to Do Good Work, and Butler
 Was Mad Clean Through - When He Knew of the Operators Oversight, He

q will tell you about one of the stran- gest freaks of locomotive that ever oc- cured in my experience on the road, ' said Harmon P, Butler, the best known Southern Pacific engineer in California, the other day. Ut happened in the sum- mer of 1884, when l was pulling freight from Tucson, A. T., to Los Angeles, andI have never come across anybody who could give an explanation of my experience, and have never been ablo to see through it my self. You may draw your own conclusions.
 1.-The night I had my experience was dark and stormy. It was i'll the period of peculiar storms and cloudbursts down in Arizona. was ordered from Tucson for the overland express that left there at mid night Somehow everything seemed to go- wrong that night. The fireman seemed to [ be slower than usual, and he had a great time getting his coal placed in the tender. The locomotive hostler at the roundhouse had forgotten to fix the oil valves, and the boiler never made steam so slowly. To make matters worse, the train dispatcher kept us in the station a plump hour past regular leaving time, and just before we started the conductor came to me and said the general superintendent was on board the tr..in and would go way through with us
 1T ought to say here, even if it does sound egotistical, that had at that time made the best time known over the South ern Pacific and was generally deputed to haul tho big bugs from the east over the road whenever they came in a special car and wanted extra consideration.
 This was the first time the superin- tendent had ever been on my train, and of course was anxious to sustain my good reputation But the fates were against mean hour late, the night dark and stormy. Well, we pulled out of the station with my mind made up to reach our des- tination on time If the wheels would stay under her. As soon as we were out of Tucson put on all the steam and let her go. But she didn't seem to move at half her usual speed, and then she didn't make steam well either. I began to be impa- tient and scolded the fireman for not do- ing good work with his fro. Ho seemed to try his best, but it was no go She would not steam we'll in spite of his exer- tions. Then the pumps began to Do trou blesome. One of them stopped working altogether, and tho other became more in effective every minute. It began to dawn on me that making up time was out of the question.
 You may imagine my feelings, for it seemed to me as if my whole reputation was staked on this trip. profess to know my business pretty we'll and can get speed out of an engine if any man can, and my heart was down below zero when we be- gan to drop behind our regular running time But it was no use. Everything was against me. I was mad clear through.
 When we left Maricopa, we were an hour and ten minutes late, and the con ductor had just made remark that net tied mo quite little. had asked him If there were any orders at Maricopa He answered, None, except to try to get to Yuma in time for dinner, which was pure sarcasm, for if we made our running time we would be there in time for breakfast. We'll, my heart was clean down in my boots, and when I shut off the steam go- ing into Big Wells I found the water so low in the boiler that something had to be done for the pump before we could leave that station, as there was then a heavy grade to climb for several miles. informed the conductor that we would be delayed 15 or 20 minutes with the work of taking down one of the pumps and then proceeded with the work.
 "We were just about ready to start again when heard tho sharp whistle of an en- zine, and looking up saw a special tour ist excursion train from southern Cali fornia approaching from tho very direction in which we were going. When the train pulled into tho station, we found that the. telegraph operator at Maricopa had neg footed to give us meeting order for this train. Had it not been for the pumps we would have dashed on to what would prob ably have been one of tho most terrible collisions in the history of railroads.
 "Now comes the remarkable part of the k1xa Inft Na11 both pumps worked like a charIn-bear in mind that found nothing whatever the matter with the pump that had taken down, and there was apparently no reason for its not working-and the old engine scanned to dart along with twice her usual speed Gradually she began to pick up time again. and in the next 50 miles we made up 15 minutes, which was lightning speed in those days. There were just 19 minutes to make up the last 20 miles in, and need not say that we pulled into our destination on time. Here was an instance of cranky engine's saving a collision that would probably have resulted in n great loss of life and property.
 "Railroading is full of such experiences. As to the peculiarities of engineers, it is not best for mo to say much, for l am queer sort of fellow myself. But there Is ono engineer ru1ulnB OH bllS rOdu nuW who thinks his engine can feel, for when she doesn't run fast enough to please him he beats her with heavy oak club that he always has aboard tho locomotive when he takes her Old Hank Hurley who ran on tho Central Pacific from Ogden to Reno for 25 years would never sleep anywhere but in his engine cab when he was out on the road, because, he said, he knew from hundreds of experiments that his own en- zine wanted constant company day and night in order to give tho best speed in her Ho told me that he had loft his on- gino alone several times in the roundhouse at night, just to prove to himself that he made no mistake in his belief, and that he invariably made poor time and had much trouble with the machinery for several days afterward.
 "The locomotive engineers here think a heap moro of their engines than tho east ern engineers. Many man out here will stick to an old engine after 1t has become so worn and old IS to be dangerous, be- cause he can't bear to give up his old ma chine. l suppose the memory of the plains and hundreds of miles VIC travel on the plains without seeing villages and cities as the engineers do in the eastern states