Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 181, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 August 1910 — VICTORY FOR SKILL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

VICTORY FOR SKILL

TRIBUTE TO ENGINEER'S QUICKNESS OF ACTION. Coolness and Promptness In Meeting Emergency Is .One of the Requisites Occuj&nt of the Cab Must Possess.

The blose calls that whiten the engineer’s hair are mostly due to some

one else’s error or 1 oversight which he cannot foresee or prevent. That many of these close calls do not result fatally is due to the engineer’s swift and skillful meeting of the emergency. The great driving wheelß on which most of the enormous weight of the locomotive rests are connected by massive jointed bars of forged steel. The ends of these are attached

to the wheels- about halfway between the axis and circumference. It is through these bars—called driving rods —that the wheels receive their impulse from the imprisoned steam. These “rods” weigh several thousands of pounds each. Occasionally one of their fastenings will break, and then every revolution of the wheel to which the other end is attached will send the rod swinging like a Titan’s flail, beating down 300 strokes a minute. Nothing can withstand these awful blows. They tear up the track below and shatter the engine above, especially the cab where rides the engineer. No disaster comes so unexpectedly and is so much dreaded as this. Almost invariably it happens when the engine is running at high speed. When a driver breaks it is a miracle if the men in the cab escape with their lives. If they do survive, and by their heroism succeed in stopping the train and avoiding a wreck, de spite the rain of blows from this huge flail of steel, their act brings forth a greater measure of praise than almost any other form of bravery that the railroad knows.

Only the other day, writes Thaddeus S. Dayton In Harper’s Weekly, one of the driving rods of a fast passenger locomotive broke while the train was running more than sixty miles an hour down the steep grades of Pickerel mountain. In an Instant the whirling bar of steel had smashed the cab and broken the controlling mechanism, so that it was impossible to bring the train to a stop by ordinary means. The great locomotive plunged forward like a runaway horse that had-thrown its rider. In some way, however, Lutz, the engineer, had escaped injury. He crept to the opposite side of the cab and climbed out through the little window upon the boiler to try to reach some of the controlling apparatus from the outside. He was working himself astride along ,the scorching boiler when suddenly Ihe engine struck a curve, which it took at terrific speed. The shock half threw the engineer from his perilous position, but he saved himself by grasping the bell rope. Then he worked himself down along the uninjured side of the swaying locomotive to where he could open one of the principal steam valves. A cloud of vapor rushed forth with a tremendous roar. Although robbed of i(s_ power, the locomotive did not Slar.’cen speed until it reached the bottom of the grade. Then, little by little. the thrashing of the great driving rod, which was pounding the upper part of the engine to- pieces, grew slower, and finally it stopped. No one was killed or injured, and not a passenger in the long train knew until it was over of the danger that had been avoided so narrowly.