The Cook County herald. [volume] (Grand Marais, Minn.) 1893-1909, 1899-12-02
SIZE NO HINDRANCE.
BIG THINGS THAT LOSE THEM
SELVES.
Railroad That Lost a aston Steel
Bridge - Boiler Disappeared from
Twenty Men-An Absent! Minded Train
Dispatcher.

Human nature will insist on losing
and mislaying things, but when the
articles get to be as big as boiler
or bridge, human ingenuity fails to
understand how it happened. A short
time ago the Cincinnati, Hamilton &
Dayton railroad had to issue pa
thetic advertisement in the local pa
pers. They had fixed a twenty-eight-
ton steel bridge on three fat cars
chained together and dispatched it to
Dayton, Ohio, with their blessing. At
an intermediate station the bridge was
observed to be bearing the journey ex-
treme1y we'll, and was seemingly in the
best OF spirits; nevertheless, when the
train arrived at it's destination not a
sign of the bridge could be discovered,
and, owing to the inability Of the COM
pany to discover any trace of their
lost property, the advertisement was
issued, begging the public, should it
meet with wandering bridge, to re-
turn 1t to its owners with all dispatch,
when substantial reward would be
given in exchange. On the Belgian rail-
way line between Antwerp and Ter
monde catastrophe was thought to
have occurred early in the spring of
1897. The passengers at the inter-
mediate stations between these places,
after waiting for some time for the
train due to leave the former place at
eight minutes past seven in the even
ing, were not a little alarmed when no
train was forthcoming Many people
thought an accident had happened,
others shook their heads and thought
of all the kidnapping stories they had
ever read, while the light-hearted sug-
| gested that the errant train had lost its
! way. AS matter. OF. fact, there was no
| accident and no train-napping, nor did
! the engine lose it's way; indeed, the
only individuals who lost anything
were the officials who lost their heads,
, and, by an unaccountable oversight
forgot to dispatch the train.
Railway wagon No. 60,474 is the
! property of the London and North
Western railway, and fifteen months
| ago it was missing, with it's contents,
consisting of one ton of copper To-
ward the end of August the wagon
turned up on siding at Leicester, but
how it got there passed the under
standing of all railway men. A year
ago an advertisement appeared in an
English country paper stating that
reward of fifty pounds was offered by
a great engineering firm to anyone who
produced a full grown torpedo that
had been lost about mile and a half
east of the Trow Rocks. 1t was COM
forting to learn that there were no ex-
plosives in the torpedo. Strangely
enough, month later, a similar fish,
put IN an appearance at Aldeburgh, in
Suffolk. This torpedo was marked
with a crown and numbered 2414 x,
and though originally charged with
working pressure Of 1850 pounds, when
it was recovered it was exhausted.
Early in 1887 peculiar case was tried
at Woolwich regarding an extraordi-
nary piece of lost property. It appeared
that man bought for els a boiler
whose size can be estimated from the
fact that it took six horses and twenty
men to move it. While this operation
was being carried out the boiler. by
some remarkable freak, managed to
lose itself, and where it went to no
man knew, nor could they find out.
though the police were put on it's track
and it was reqested to return to it's
sorrowing friends. Some years elapzei
and then, when a surveyor in the Office
of works was estimating the value of
fine crop of scrap iron that a piece
of ground known as mo Mans Land"
| had yielded, he spied the boiler: but
being ignorant of it's history, ordered
it to be sold by auction, at which sale
| it realized So los. Then the original
owner recognized his long lost prop
erty, and sued the surveyor for the SIS
it cost him. Eventually the Judge
awarded him ten guineas, while the
| surveyor received five shillings for the
trespass. It was learned that the
| three-years-lost boiler had hid itself
| on piece Of land quite near it's own
| er's residence
| Silenced Ingersoll.