The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1896-02-09

1T sTAR1Eo A nv E3EEO or CAT
TIE IN TRE DELAWARE VALLEY.

agree " fEE lie A.ClfhGu EOIN OeAhAH-
The Explanation Ofcred For che Csl's
Strange Freak.
''It ism; likely that there is any uf
the Coe Little breed of cattle left i'll the
upper Delaware valley" said a veteran
railroad man, because. by this time,
their identity must have been destroyed
though mixture with other breeds. 1t
doesn't matter, for there was nothing
of particular note about that breed Of
cattle, except the way they happened TO
/ Re introduced into that locality.
In those days live stock transrorta-
tion was one of the Erie's big items of
traffic Trains half mile long, loaded
with horned cattle, horses, sheep and
/ hogs, used TO pass over the road two or
three times day Such thing is al
most curiosity nowadays. COe Little
was conductor of one of these stock
trains between Susquehanna and Port
Jervis. He left Susquehanna one night,
/ in those good old days of Tailroading,
/ with long train of cattle cars. Those
i trains were next TO passenger trains IN
class, and We're run over the road a-hum-
ming. Conductor Little delivered his
train at Port Jervis IN time, and hand
ed over his way bills, which he had re-
ceived at Susquehanna, and on which
! the number, character and contents Of
every car in his train were recorded.
y hen the agent at Port Jervis compared
Little's train ON this voucher, one car
VAS missing. Tho car was entered on the
way bill as having left Susquehanna all
right, but it wasn't in the train. Its
( place, according TO the bill, was about
III the middle Of the train.
We'll. here was a situation. Coe
Little declared that every car was in
the train when he left Susquehanna, for
he had checked the number of each one
on the way bill himself. He certainly
h;,dn t delivered the missing car TO any
one on the way, and he couldn t see how
any one could have sneaked in and sto-
len it, especially as the train had been
Oh the mcve pretty much all the time
between Susquehanna and Port Jervis
A telegram was sent to the agent at Sus-
quehanna, asking for information about
the missing car. The reply was that
nothing was known there that could
throw any light ON the subject; quite
the contrary, for the agent corrobOrated
LiEtle's report The car was i'll the train
when it left Susquehanna.
During the efforts of the puzzled
railroad men at Port Jervis to solve the
mystery of the lost car, some one dis
covered that the car that should have
been just behind the missing one was
coupled to the one that should have
been just ahead of it without the aid Of
a compiling pin, the link being broken in
such a way that ii had become hook.
which was fast in the uiuhOle in the
coupler of the other car. This didn't
help matters Il little bit, and rather
daepened the mystery.
They were still deep in efforts to
solve the mystery, and car tracer was
..i.ut to be sent back over the road TO
! See if he could find the car, when tele-
gram came from Shohola, a station Is
= niles west Of Port Jervis. The agent at
= that station said III effect that some
body's cattle car was astray in a field
along the Delaware river Just beyond
SEohola station, and that somebody had
be, ter come and look after it. The
viacking gang was sent up from Port
Jervis, and, sure enough, i'll the middle
/ OF Il field, 100 feet or more from the
railroad, stood the missing cattle car.
} right as a triyet, except that its doors
. were open and its cattle gone. To get
where it was the car had run down a
ten foot embankment, across a wagon
, road and through a stout rail fence.
. There was only one way to explain
: the freak of the car in qnitting its train
SO unceremoniously. Going east along
r that part of the Erie the track is on a
heavy down grade. Just before reaching
{ ShuhOla the coupling pin that held the
| car to the one ahead of it must have
/ broken. This divided the train in two
parts. The head car Of the rear part
Jumped the track, and breaking the link
ihat held it to the car behind it, went
Oh down the bank, getting out of the
way Of the cars following on the track
when the leading section Of the di-
vided train got to the foot Of the grade
its speed Slackened. The hind section
caught up with it, and ran into the
rear car, but not with force sufficient to
DO any damage or attract attention.
The broken link, then a hook, happened
TO fall into the pinhole of the coupler
ahead of it. The train was thus recon-
pied and went on to Port Jervis without
The loss of a car right ont of its very
center having been discovered by any
one. There is no parallel to this one III
the record of mishaps to railroad trains,
and it has never ceased to be a wonder
to all old time railroad men.
We'll, whether the doors of the fugi-
tive car were broken by the jar and jolt
Of its trip down the bank, through the
fence, and across the lot, or whether the
cattle inside kicked them open, / can It
say. They were open, aud the cattle
jumped out. 1t was winter, and the