By Richard Hardy
On September 21 of 1910 there was a trolley
wreck where 42 people were kill and 7 were injured. Two trolley cars had
crashed into each other on a sharp curve near Kingsland and Bluffton, Indiana
both of which are close to Fort Wayne, Indiana. The two trolleys had collided
when there was a misunderstanding and one of the trolleys had gotten onto the
wrong tracks. One of the trolleys had more people in it; it had so many people
in it to where there was no room and people were forced to stand on the
trolley. Making it impossible for more people to get onto the train. Most of
the damage came from the trolley that had much more people on it, slid through
most of the other trolley. Making this the worst railroad accident Indiana has
ever seen to date. Kingsland and Bluffton are both small towns in northwest
Indiana.
The area of Wells County, which
include both towns, Bluffton and Kingsland, were your typical small towns that
not really anyone has heard of unless you are from that area. They were/are
lowly populated and just add a little bit of diversity to the large area around
them (Fort Wayne.) They really do not stand out to people to visit because of
something special there, they’re both just your regular suburb. Many of the
victims were from the two towns and were reason for the great mourning that had
happened from the tragic event.
Before the disaster had occurred one man, John
R. Boyd, who had not been able to get a seat on the crowded train and was
forced to stand on the step and hold on in the north bound car, was able to get
a view of what was coming ahead on the tracks and saw the other car was on the
same tracks as his car and jumped from the car. This ultimately saved his life
and made it without any injuries. When asked what he say he said, “There was a
splintering crash, a dull, grinding as a wood and iron resolved themselves into
a mass of wreckage and mingled with human blood and flash and bones. The big
limited car seemed to climb upon the frailer and the heaver loaded car and from
its pilot to within six feet of the rear swept over the crowded coach making it
almost clean. That anything alive could have survived that terrible sweep of
splintered wood and twisted steel is a miracle. Following the crash, there was
a period of appalling stillness and then the shrieks and groans of the wounded
and dying rose upon the air.”1
The town of Bluffton is a small town
where not many things happen but the day after the wreck it had awoken with
more realization to what had happened in the previous days disaster. For the
next few days nothing really happened in the town, the town had almost gone
completely still. In a town so small such a tragic event makes the people weary
of what also is going on. Everything around the town seemed to be completely
quiet. Businesses did not receive much business the next day and it seemed as
though the town was almost mourning what had happened the previous day.1 The
town was affected in more ways than just physically.
When such a small town is hit with something so
tragic it affects the whole town, where I am from we had a man who was deployed
off to Afghanistan to fight for our great country. Though I was unable to find
any information on how the towns of Bluffton and Kingsland dealt with the
disaster I can make of it from how my hometown was affected by the army man’s
death. He was killed by an IED when he was rushing the aid of the two injured
Marines. When the small town that I am from heard the information, the entire
town and also some of the surrounding towns were mourning the death. Everything
that had been going on in the town didn’t seem to matter. Everyone just seemed
to mourn for felt like an eternity, being in a small town things affect those
around you because regardless of if you know the people or person that is
killed in a tragedy personally, you know of the person. Also it seems that
sadness from a tragedy seems to get to everyone in a small town setting. Having
a closer bond is something that people in small towns have. They are used to knowing
everyone around them and when you know the people that are affected by tragedy
personally it causes more of mourning.
The trolley car tragedy to happen in such a
small town is terrible. In a small setting, when something tragic happens it
usually brings together the small town. In Bluffton, the tragedy stuck and when
it did, people rushed to try and help out. There were two medics on the train
and luckily one of them had been able to survive the crash without being too
terribly injured and was able to help those who had debris from the train on
top of them.2 Help wasn’t able to get there very fast because of the
time of the tragedy being in a time where the technology to get ahold of the
people that they needed to get ahold of to come and help the injured and dead
people that were on the trolleys during this tragic event was not available.
Though they did the best they could to get there and to try and get the people
to the hospital to get the treatment they desperately needed. The victims were
sent to the nearby Saint Joseph’s hospital were the bodies were worked on to
try and help those that were injured but did not die.
The reason for the crash is still unknown but
the only reasonable thought would be that the motorman on the northbound train
is the man to be blamed for wreck.1 He was supposed to clear the
tracks about a mile back so the southbound trolley, which had the right of way,
could make it through and they would have avoided each other and could have
avoided the whole tragedy. The motorman, B. T. Corkwell who did not clear the
tracks was also killed in the accident making it not possible for him to be
questioned to find out if he ignored his orders on purpose, forgot, or simply
wasn’t told which it is said that he was by his boss. With the reason unknown
on why the accident had occurred it made it harder for the people of the town
to try and figure out what had happened from the tragic event. There was no way
to clean up or fix anything that happened from the tragic event since there is
not any way to figure out if there was a malfunction with the tracks or if it
was the motorman who was did not follow his directions or whatever it was that
had happened with the trolley not getting out of the other one’s way.
Not being able to find a reliable reason for
why the disaster had happened did not allow the people of the town to make the
changes that could have been made. Such as building another track so that there
are not two trolleys going at the same time on the same track and if they are
to have them positioned so that they are going the same direction or have more
time to get into a different lane before the other trolley car is coming down
the same lane. There are not really changes that the community can make with
themselves through the event other than getting their taxes raised so that the
money that the government earns from their taxes could be used to make the
changes to the tracks or they could start donations.
Looking back on such a tragic event it can
cause the people around the area to be affected in more ways than just
physical. It will usually bring a community closer than they were prior to the
event. Since this had happened in a small town setting, usually the town is
already pretty closely knit. Through the event the town of Bluffton was
affected to the extent of what could be said as the whole town was mourning.
People tried to see what could be the bright side on a terrible event with a
quote from someone from the town to Fort Wayne Journal Gazette retrospective,
“That anything alive could have survived hat terrible sweep of splintered wood
and twisted steel is a miracle.”1&3
Looking back on the disastrous event that had
happened during the year of 1910 it can be taken from it that disasters will be
bad and that it might seem hard to take something from it but you can always
come together and stay strong. Things in life happen whether you are ready for
them or not. The community of Bluffton and Kingsland came together as a
community when this tragic event happened. It was hard to get over what had
happened when it first had become known to the community when the towns had
grown completely silent and the businesses in the town were not getting the
business that they needed when it happened because the community was not ready
to face the world after all that happened. When things happen people rise the
occasion and try and overcome the problems. They have been able to keep the
trolleys to not have any more disasters to the extent that this one had made
the people face. There are sides to everything that need to be looked at. There
was a man who had jumped from the trolley when he had seen that there was
another trolley coming toward his trolley on the same tracks. You can take from
it that this one man had not been there more people could have died. He was
able to get to the wreck shortly after it had happened and had been able to try
and get some people out from under the fallen debris before people could get
there and attend to the peoples needs and getting them to a hospital.
Tragic events grow the community together. It
makes them realize that what is going on in the different lives of the
community that people they know, are close to or are even related to could be
gone in no time what so ever. Communities, big or small, are still a community
and things that happen affect them and even people that are around them.
Looking back on what things were said about
this tragedy and how it affected the community tie together. A small town
setting does not always have the resources that are needed to make things work
perfectly. This trolley was going to a fair that was close by and they were
unable to fit all the passengers on one trolley so they had to get another.
Could that have been a message from somewhere else? Could this had been done by
the motorman on purpose because he was trying to get there as soon as possible
because this trolley wasn’t expected? There are a lot of things that could be
taken into account here. But there is one thing that is for sure, disasters can
happen, it is not about what happens in that disaster. It matters how the
community around the disaster react to what has happened.
Works
Cited
"Trolley Wreck on Indiana Road Kills 42,
Hurts 7."Chicago Daily Tribune, September 22, 1910.
("Trolley Wreck on Indiana
Road Kills 42, Hurts 7" 1910)
Beitler, Stu. GenDisasters,
"GenDisasters." Last modified June 18, 2008. Accessed March 3, 2014.
http://www3.gendisasters.com/indiana/6939/kingsland-in-terrible-interurban-accident-sep-1910.
Word Press, "Trams Stop Here." Last
modified September 24, 2010. Accessed March 3, 2014.
http://tramsstophere.wordpress.com/2010/09/24/indiana-interurban-crash-recalled/.
