The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-09-20

In order to meet objection on the score of
the impossible and 20 anticipate inquiry
as to whether THE Dispatcher's story Is
true. 1t may be well TO state frankly at the
outset that this tale in it's inexplicable
psychological features is a transcript from
the queer things in the railroad life. 1t is
based on an extraordinary happening that
fell within the experience of the president
OF large Western railway system. Wheth-
er the story, suggestive from any point of
view Of mystery, can be regarded as DEM
onstration OF the efficacy OF prayer may be
a dispurabIe question. In passing, however.
Il Is only fair 10 say that the circumstance
on which the tale is based was so regard
ed by the dispatcher himself and by those
familiar with the circumstance.
An hundred times, If once, the thing had
been, on appeals foy betterment, before the
board OF directors 1t was the piece of
track on the Mountain division that train
men shook their heads over-the Peace
river stretch To run any sort of a line
through that canyon would take the breath
OF engineer. Give him all the money
he could ask and it would Singer Wetmore
himself. Brodie in. his day said there was
nothing worse in the Andes and Brodie,
before he drifted into the Rockies. had
seen. first and last, pretty much all of the
CHILEAN work
But our men had the Job to do with one
half the money they needed. The lines to
run, the grades TO figure, the culverts to
put in. the fills to make, the blasting to do,
the tunnel to bore, the bridge to build-in
limit; that was the curse OF 1.-THE limit
And they did the best they could. But
will be candid: If a section and elevation
OF Rosamond's bower and section and
elevation of our Peace river work were put
upIto stand for prize at a civil engineers
cake walk the decision would go. and quick,
to the Peace river track There are only
eight miles OF it: but our men would back
Il against any eighty on earth for whipping
curves. tough grades, villainous approach
es and railroad tangle generally.
The directors always have promised to
Improve il. and they are promising yet.
Thanks TO what HALEY taught them, there's
a good bridge there now-pneumatic cais-
sons sunk to the bed. It's the more pity
they haven't eliminated the dread mainline
curves that approach ii, through a valley
which I brief as a canyon and the Maui
VASES Terres rolled into one single propo-
sition.
Yet we do lots Of business along that
stretch Our engineers thread the cuts and
are glad to get safely through them Our
roadmasters keep up the elevations, hoping
some night the blooming right of way will
tumble into perdition. Our dispatchers,
studying under shaded lamps, think Of 1t
with their teeth ciinched, and hope there
never Will be any trouble on that stretch.
Trouble is our portion and trouble we must
get. but not there. Let IL come; but let it
come anywhere except on the Peace.
1t was In the golden days of the battered
old Wickiup that the story opens; when
Blackburn sat in the night chair. The days
when the Old Guard were still there before
death aud fame and circumstance had
stolen our first commanders and left only us
little fellows, forgotten by every better
fate. to tell their greater stories.
HALEY had the bridges then, and Wet
more the locating. and Neighbor the round
houses, and Bucks the SUPPLEMENTARY, and
Callahan. so he claimed, the work, and
Blackburn had the night trick.
When Blackburn came from the plains he
brought record clean as the book of life.
Four years on station key; then eight
years at Omoha dispatching, with never a
blunder or a break TO the eight years. But
IL was at Omaha that Blackburn lost the
wife whose face he carried in his watch. /
never heard the story. only some rumor Of
how young she was and how pretty, and
how he buried her and the wee baby to-
gether. 1t was all Blackburn brought to
the West End mountains, his record and
the little face in the watch. They said he
had no kith or kin on earth, besides the
wife and hady back on the bluffs of the Mis-
souri,; and he came on the night trick
with u.s.
1 was just a boy around the Wickiup
then, but 1 remember the crowd; who could
forget them? They were jolly good fellows;
sometimes there were very high jinks.
don't mean anybody drunk or that sort; but
good tobacco TO smoke and good songs to
sing and good stories to tell-and Lord
how they could tell them And when the
pins slipped, as they would, and things went
wrong, as they will. there We're clear heads
and pretty wits and stout hearts to put
things right.
Blackburn, as much as I can remember,
always enjoyed it; but in a different way.
He had at such times a MANNER like nobody
else's-a silent. beaming manner When
Bucks would roll great white Panhandle
yarn over his fresh linen shirt front and
down his COOL clean white arms, one of
them always barred TO the Understanding
his points with the ash of San Francisco
cigar-and Neghbor would begin to heave
from the middle up like a hippopotamus
and Callahan would laugh his whiskers full
OF dew. and HALEY would yen with delight
and the slaves in the next room would
double upon the dead at the story. Black
burn would sit with his laugh all in a smile,
but never a noise or word He enjoyed
1t all; not doubt OF that; only it was
all tempered, / reckon, by something that
had gone before At least. that's the way
IL now strikes me. and 1 watched those big
fellows pretty close--the fellows who were
TO turn. while I was growing up among
them. into managers and presidents and
masnates; and some OF them from every
dav cafch- oh ga men with the COM