Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 September 1885 — Getting Off a Flying Train. [ARTICLE]

Getting Off a Flying Train.

“Practice makes,perfect,” observed tho train boy as he folded and smoothed the newspapers he had gathered from the seats, getting them ready to be sold again. “Practice makes perfect. If a railroad man jumps from a train when it is making twenty miles an hour he does pretty veil if he keeps his feet, but I used to jump off the limited express on the New York Central when it was making fifty miles an hour. Did this time and again, and often with a basket of peanuts in my hands, never spilling a peanut.” “Go and tell that to some greenhorn,” remarked the brakeman, as he sneaked an orange into his overcoat pocket; “don’t tell me any such lies. I know better." “But it’s the honest truth,” insisted the train boy, “and I’ll tell you how I did it. You are not too old tqjearn a thing or two, and now just keep your mouth shut and your ears open. I had a run on a special Chicago express. Every Saturday night I wanted to stop off at the town where my girl lived, but the special made i)o stop there. So I had to go up the road to Syracuse and there take a local train back. One day it occurred tome that by a little strategy I might get oft the limited at the station, and save all that time. I had noticed that just before we got to the station where my girl lived we always passed & local train, running in the same direction we were, and on the track next to us. Usually our train was going jnst a little faster than the local. So one day I locked up my box, put some candy iu my pocket, and got down on the lower step. Just as we caught up with the rear end of the local I stepped across to the lower step of the last car of the other train. It was just as easy as stepping from one freight car to another in the same train, even if we were making fifty miles an hour. In five minutes the local slacked up and Stopped at the station, and there I was. Think about that a minute or two, you thick-headed stove-stoker, and don’t be so fresh about telling your betters that they lie. Ten cents for that orange, please. ” — Chicago” Her aid.