Jasper County Democrat, Volume 9, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 March 1907 — THANKFUL TO BEALIVE [ARTICLE]

THANKFUL TO BEALIVE

Those Caught in the Wreck of the Eighteen - Hour New York-Chicago Flyer. NO DEATH IS NOW EXPECTED Postmaster Kline, of Joliet, Seems Due to Recover. Fred Busse, the Chicago Postmaster, Will Rest for Ten Days, but Has No Bones Broken—Others Doing Well. Pittsburg, Feb. 25.—The condition of the passengers injured in the wreck of the Pennsylvania special near South Fork, six miles from Johnstown, Pa., Sunday morning, is reported from the Altoona (Pa.) hospital and the Allegheny general hospital, in this city, as being excellent. John F. Kline, postmaster of Joliet, 111., who is the most seriously injured, passed a favorable day. In addition to many cuts and bruises Kline sustained a puncture of the lung. It is said at the Altoona hospital that he will recover, however, unless complications set in. Busse Laid Up for Ten Days. Frederick A. Busse, postmaster of Chicago; Samuel F. Nixon and Felix Isman, Philadelphia; Frank P. Rodgers, Chicago; E. J. Murphy, Joliet, 111., and C. W. Winkler, Chicago, who are also in the Altoona hospital, are resting easily and will be aide to leave the institution in about ten days. 11. F. Pippenbrink, Joliet, 111., was able to go home yesterday. W. IL Baker, of Chicago, who was in the Allegheny general hospital, has' departed for home, and J. Wood Wilson. Marion, Ind., and Thomas Bauer, of Lafayette. Ind., will, it is said, leave the hospital in a couple of days. Busse was imprisoned in one of the wrecked cars for half an hour before being rescued. He is bruised all over the body, but has no broken bones. Kline was returning home with his commission in his pocket reappointing

him postmaster at Joliet. Altogether fifty-four passengers, all there were on the train, and ten train men were injured, and the names given in the foregoing are all who were at all seriously hurt. The others were all able to travel to their destinations the day of the accident. The wreck occurred as the train was rounding a sharp curve, with the south fork of the Conemaugh river on the outside, at the foot of an embankment sixty feet high, and it was a miracle that many were not killed. Had a Right To Be Thankful. The (train was running about fifty minutes late, and was traveling over fifty miles an hour when it reached the curve. The accident was caused by a brake rigging dropping to the track on the first Pullman coach following the engine and combination smoking car. The great speed and weight of the train tore up the tracks and the steel ties for a distance of 300 feet. The engine and smoking car remained on the rails, but the three Pullman coaches plunged from the track down over the sixty-foot embankment, where they rolled over and over to the thick ice covering the Conernangh river. All the passengers were thankful and happy that they had escaped death, and Rev. Edward Cope, of Philadelphia, conducted brief services on the relief train, in which he thanked God for their deliverance.