Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1902-05-23
A FEATHERED MASCOT.
Mike, a Sparrow That Made ReGu-
Iar Trips ON an Engine for
Two Years.


Thiso sounded like arithmetic, but
1T wasn't. 1t was just business, rail-
road business, pertaining to the very
busy life of Henry Mccarthy, who,
for % years has pulled the lever on
engines that have pulled great trains
toward Kansas City sometimes and
toward Denver at others, over the old
Kansas Pacific, or Union Pacific, as
It is now known, says the Denver
Post.
The numbers he mentioned re-
ferred to the numbers of the trains
IS and % His engine, Mccarthy said,
is 1474, "and a better one of the
kind" he added, in the phraseology
of MY Uncle Toby" you wouldn't
find in a dozen years."
Mccarthy was an engineer before
he came to Colorado in 1878, and he
barring three years when he was in
the sheep business in Lincoln county
"a disastrous three years ending in
total loss of 1,00U sheep, which gave
up the ghost under the asphyxiating
force of waterspout.
sand that's the way I went out of
the sheep business and back to rail-
roading."
But Mr.. Mccarthy is a modest man,
If his hair is short on top, and doesn't
talk unless he is drawn out. There
are those who can draw him out,
however, and one of those got at him
the other night and touched the right
spring.
mo. I'm not superstitious," he be-
gan, as they all begin, when they are
asked if they have any haunting
ideas, "but I don't mind telling you
of a curious thing which happened
to me back east when I used to work
a throttle on the Fort Wayne road.
ga little bird lit on the pilot of my
engine one day as we were passing
through Kokomo, Ind. Some crumbs
left ON the small platform by some
body attracted it's attention. It
picked and picked at the crumbs till
we had travelled 90 miles further to
Peru Ind. There it finished it's meal
and flew away. I didn't think any
mole about the circumstances till
neg day, when on my return through
Pecu I again noticed this small
bl own bird. It fluttered about the
pilot for n moment and seemed to
miss something. Realizing at once
that this was the same little bird
which had travelled with me on the
previous day. I at once unpacked my
lunch box and threw some crumbs
out on one of the running boards.
THE bird caught on at once. He
was an awfully cute little fellow and
began to pick at the dinner I had
thrown out to him. He rode back
with me to Kokomo and there de-
serted me. The next time I came
through he was waiting for me, and
I had his breakfast ready for him,
all spread out.
''Well, sir, that little fellow rode
with me sfor two years. took a
great interest in him, and he got so
tame he would come right up into
the cab and eat lunch with me. I
inquired and found that Mike as
we called him, was one of the de-
spised English sparrows, but we
didn't despise 0him; we thought the
world OF him-Joe Hennesey, my
fireman, and /.
eve didn't know what a crusade
was on against the sparrows or we
would have looked out better for
Mike, but one day when we came
through Kokomo Mike missed his
train. Tt was the first time he had
missed it since we had made his &C
quaintance, and we worried about
him throughout the whole run. When
we got back to Kokomo on the re-
turn trip we learned that there had
been Z great slaughter of sparrows.
end we knew little Mike had been
one cf the victims.
well, it just knocked US out. We
lad leSrred. to love the pert little
sra.-cs.'. and we mourned for him as IL