The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-11-28
IRON HORSE FRANKS
ONE LOCOMOTIVE BROKE INTO A HOME IN TIME FOR BREAKFAST.
A Fire Box Sets the Brakes. Loss of Four Driving Wheels At Once. Lightning Cuts Out an oil Car
 From Train.

breath escapes, and other queer hap
 pennings on the rail. All agreed that
 many of the incidents that had come into their experience as railroad vet
 erans were strange past belief on the
 part of anyone not in the business. says
 the Chicago Chronicle.
 First queer railroad accident I ever
 heard of, said the oldest member of the party, happened when I was boy. It l was on what was then the New London
 and Northern Railroad. A family liv-
 ing in a little house almost opposite
 the beginning of the college boat race | course was eating breakfast as quiet iy as you please one morning. The l head of the house had just remarked
 that the o'clock train was late that morning
 |" There she is now, though he add | ed. as the train came around curve | into his view. The next minute there
 was a frightful crash and smashing; | he and all the other members of his family. though unhurt. were terribly frightened and all had jumped from | their seats. It took them several min utes to realize that they had been vic- | tims of most remarkable railroad accident
 Locomotive at Breakfast. | | jumped the track just in front of the house, knocking down a part of the front wall; the COW catcher had been | smashed, but the bogey truck had made | its way clear into the house and the old-fashioned, flaring ssmokestack then | in use almost filled the hole that had been made in the front wall. The | newspapers of those days gave a lot | of prominence to that accident and I | remember that one of the illustrated | weeklies had a picture of it entitled "A locomotive at Breakfast
 ''The only man hurt in one of the | most curious accidents of the present year." said one of the half dozen story
 tellers. was the conductor who jump | ed and was killed when he would have been unhurt had he remained at his post. ''On the Shore line, near New Haven, | few years ago a train was pulling | slowly into the city over a long trestle,
 when something happened to the rear
 car, and 1t toppled and fell off the
 trestle. The coupling held, pulled the next car off, 1t in turn derailed the
 next and so on until all the cars were in the marsh. Then the coupling broke, | the baggage car and engine remaining on the rails.
 Jump Breaks His Neck.
 '"The cars that fell into the marsh
 were only half overturned and no one on board was hurt. But the conductor who was in the baggage car and saw | the rear cars go over in time to jump,
 promptly did so, and, landing on his head, broke his neck. He was quite dead when picked up. | That was a piece of bad luck the match of which befell a fellow at Cro- ton Falls, N. Y, few years ago, though
 his luck was good. not bad. He was | driving home one dark night. Either reached the Croton River, instead of sticking to the highway and crossing | the stream over the wagon bridge he | took the railroad.
 "The horse had taken only a few steps on the bridge when his legs went | through the ties. The driver had hard | ly realized where he was when he heard the rumble and whistle of an ap- preaching train. The only thing he could do under the circumstances was to jump into the river. and though he knew that the water was at least sev- enty feet below the bridge. he took the risk. landing in the water mighty well scared, but unhurt. He was res- cued by some men who heard his cries for help. The engineer of the train saw the horse and wagon in time to slow up, and the train was not thrown off, put the horse was Killed and the pas- sengers were badly shaken up."
 Four Drives Let Loose.
 It was a Western man who spoke next.
 "Oddest accident ever knew any thing about" he said, was on the Rock Island. nearly twenty years ago. It isn't credited by many men to whom I tell 1t, but you are seasoned railroad men, and I'll venture to repeat 1t. It happened some sixty or seventy miles west of Chicago. An East-bound train was bowling along, perfectly straight stretch of road, when all four drivers let loose at the same time and went rolling along the prairie.
 The engineer and firemen were mighty near going daffy over it. To lose one driver is bad enough and ex- tremely unusual. and to lose four at once Is absolutely incredible. but as- sure you, gentlemen, that the thing ac- tually happened as I am telling it. No great damage was done, the bogey trucks. just back of the pilot, held and the fire box settled and dragged along the track little distance. But the settling was just enough to break the air connection; that set the brakes and the train soon came to a standstill."
 The New York State engineer present looked admiringly at the Western man as he finished. # *. ...: '#= s...
 Believes the Story.
 Good story partner.' he said, "and for one I believe 1t. I believe your statement that the men on the negine were surprised too. I never knew about all four of them breaking loose from the same engine simultaneously but on the New York. New Haven and Hartford in September, 1905 the right | front driver and the left rear driver Of a Port Chester local parted company with their axles at the same time
 Nobody was hurt, but the engineer put on the emergency brake so sud denly that the stop Jared the passen- gers a lot One of the loose drivers grazed the side of a fast through train | for Boston, ripping off some of the | woodwork of some of the cars and mak- | ing a noise that frightened the passen- | gers half out their wits.
 The only other time I knew anyting | about a driving wheel getting away | was in Pennsylvania. nine miles west of Trenton N J., on the Philadelphia | and Reading. There was only one left l wheel, but 1t rolled into the midst of l gang of track laborers. hit two or three | of them. knocked them down, and | scared the rest almost to death.
 Broken Rail Picked Up.
 we were making pretty high speed | for those days. going along about as fast as we dared, behind time, when | the engine struck a rail with a flaw in 1t. broke off and threw a three-foot niece of 1t clear out and over to the | very edge of the right of way. I saw 1t go and was horror-stricken. I ex-