East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1906-05-23
Father Coffin, Evangelist
of Railroad Men

The Memphis, (Tenn,) News-Scimi-
tar is conducting a department called
1.-The Throttle" while the Brother
hood of Locomotive Engineers Is
meeting in that city this week.
In this department appears an in
terview upon the life and work of
Father" Coffin, the evangelist of the
railroad men of the United States,
who is well known to railroad men
west, The article from "The Throt-
tie" is as follows:
Enthroned in an easy chair in the
Gayoso lobby, Father" Lorenzo s.
Coffin received the sincere and hearty
homage of every delegate and visitor
who entered. not one passing the
"Grand Old Man" without pausing to
shake his hand and express delight at
seeing him so hale and hearty. For
the railroad mems debt of gratitude
to Father" Coffin can never be set
tied in full, and they know it.
Although not railroad man by
profession, Father" Coffin has done
more for their welfare than probably
any other man now living, and to
him are the men indebted for the pas
sage of laws compelling the use of au-
tomato couplers and of air brakes on
freight trains But above all this.
he is the founder and indefatigable
worker for the Railroad Mems Home
and that is his hobby. Next to the
home comes the r. r. 7. A., or Rail-
road Total Abstinence, and Father
Coffin would as soon think OF appear
ing without his shirt as without one
of the significant little buttons.
From his conversation with a re-
porter for The Throttle, 1t would
seem that the venerable veteran
knows much more about these two in
stitutions than he does about Lorenzo
S. Coffin, for on these he will talk
by the hour, but on the subject of
Father Coffin he is reticent.
"As a member of the Iowa railway
commission" he opened, "I was
thrown much with railroad men, and
they won my admiration. No man
endurcs more hardships, nor accepts
them with greater fortitude, and my
mind was made up that the dangers
of their calling should be lessened. So
pushed a bill for automatic coup
lers and for air brakes on freight
trains, which was finally signed by
President Harrison in 1894. Through
the use of automatic couplers thous-
ands of lives have been saved, while
the air brake is similar blessing.
"The K. r. T. A. originated in
1892, at Atlanta, where I persuaded a
number Of men at the convention to
adopt the little button. and now it is
known throughout the country. Start
ing with half a dozen, l have since
personally distributed over 10000,
while the men themselves have also
made an army of converts"
To repeat Father Coffin's descrip-
ton of the Railway Mems Home, and
describe his ambitions for it's future,
is impossible-one must hear him do
it. The home is located at Highland
Park, is miles north of Chicago, and
there, as Father Coffin quotes. 1.-THE
wicked cease from troubling and the
weary are at rest" The home has
been running for 1S years, and Father
Coffin is now working for perma-
nent endowment fund that will insure
its perpetuity.
In an address to the engineers
Thursday, Father Coffin asked their
aid through the medium of small con-
tributions. his idea being that each
engineer and each member of the Or
der of Railroad Conductors should
pledge himself to pay so cents a year
toward the fund, while trainmen and
firemen are to chip in 25 cents apiece
every 10 months.
"By this method" he explains. "the
endowment fund will be quickly rails
ed and no one will feel the burden"
And the old mans face lightened up
at the prospect.
With his grizzled beard and i'm
maculate Panama hat, Father Coffin
has long been an Indispensable feat
ure at the conventions. but never has
he been made more welcome than at
the present meeting.