Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1901-05-31
RACED FOR a SWITCH.
TERRIFIC COLLISION OF ELEc.
TRIO CARS OCCURS At +.
= re .% F ALBANY, N. Y. Z. ~ Vi Il
Five Passengers Killed and Forty So.
rIousIy 'njured-caused by One Mo-
torman Running on Another's Time.
Both Were Going Forty Miles an
Hour at the Time-The Cars Torn
to spIinters-~ I"

to Splinters.. -:
Albany, May 27.-Electric cars rae
ing for switch while running in op-
posite directions at the rate of 40
miles an hour cost five lives by ter
rifle collision, in which over 40 prom1-
nent people were injured, some IA
tally and others seriously. The dead
are: Frank Smith and William Mich
OILS, motormen; Maud Kellogg OF
Round Lake; Annie Rooney Of Stuyes-
want Falls, and David Mahoney, mate
on the Dean Richard. George c..
Barry, Troy, and Fred ]. Smith, AL
bany, were fatally injured.
The lobby of the local postoffice
filed with dead and wounded, hysteri-
cal women and children looking for
relatives and friends, surgeons ad-
ministering temporary relief and am
balances racing through the city TAX
ing the wounded to hospitals, were
the early intimations of the accident.
The scene of the accident was a
point about two miles out of Green
Bush, on the line of the Albany and
Hudson railway. The point where the
cars met on the single track was at
sharp curve, and so fast were both
running and so sudden was the COLI
sion that the motorman never had
time to put on the brakes before
southbound car No. % had gone al
most clean through northbound
car No. II and hung on the edge of
high bluff with it's load of shrieking.
MANNED humanity. One motorman
was killed instantly, while the other
one lived but a few minutes.
Fully 100 men, women and children
formed struggling, shrieking pyra-
mid, mixed with blood, detached
Portions Of Human Bodies
and the wreckage of the cars. Some
of the more slightly injured of the.
men extricated themselves and began
to pull people out of the rear ends of
the two cars and almost every one
was taken out in this way and nearly
all were badly injured. In little
time the bruised mass Of humanity,
with the mutilated dead for grue-
oO1uC anu SI4Sl1l COlupduy, WClC AOdu'
ed on extra cars and taken to Albany.
There ambulances and physicians had
been summoned and the postoffice
turned into morgue and hospital.
AS fast as the physicians could tenn
porarily fix up the wounded they we're
taken to their homes or to the hos
pitfalls.
With both motormen killed it was
hard to get at the real cause of the
accident, but it was pretty we'll deter
mined that it was caused by an at
tempt Of the southbound car to reach
second switch instead of waiting for
the northbound car at the first siding.
The cars weigh Is tons each and
are the largest electric cars built, but
so frightful was the crash that both
cars were torn almost to splinters.
Both cars were filed with pleasure
seekers. The cars on the line were
running at switch headway-that is,
as car reached a siding switch it
was supposed to wait until another
going in the opposite direction passed.
The motorman Of the southbound car
reached one of the switches, but see
ing no northbound car decided to
take chances and go on at the next
siding. It was at curve between
that the two cars met