Thoughtfully curated historical journalism
Automatic safety signals are being Installed on the Sand Hill and Brick Yard crossings on the Maine Central Railroad in Winslow. Several months ago hearings were held at the Winslow town hall relative to making these crossings safer and the decision rendered was to Install two electric safety signals at the Sand Hill crossing and one signal at the Brick Yard crossing which is on Bay street.
ldlewild, August 8, 1859
Dear Morris : There is one class of sights upon a new railroad which are very interesting while their freshness lasts—the places that have been taken by surprise. On the line of the streak of lightning that was thrown over the Alleghanies by the Baltimore thunder-cloud of thirty-one million dollars, is a succession of far-hidden remotenesses—wild valleys, cascades, solitary shanties and mountain fastnesses—many of which were thought by the hunter, or by the pioneer settler, wholly unreachable by common thoroughfares, and, in fact, inaccessible to all visitings but the eagle’s, but which have been laid open, almost with the suddenness of a thunderbolt, and are now daily looked at from crowded freight trains and expresses, as familiar to the man in the locomotive as the signs of a street!
The best manufactory of Locomotive Engines in this country, is the establishment owned by Baldwin, Vail & Hussey, Broad street, Philadelphia. Since this company began their labors, few short years ago, they have manufactured one hundred and twenty-nine locomotive engines. Of this number twenty-six have been for the Columbia and Philadelphia Railway, twelve for the Utica and Schenectady, and ten for the Georgia Rail Road.
Express Train Plunges Over High Embankment After Running into Open Switch
ATLANTIC CITY, July 3.—An open switch sent seven persons to their death and resulted in injury to about 75 others, about half of them seriously, when the Camden-Atlantic City night express on the Philadelphia Reading railroad running at full speed, left the rails on a curve at Winslow Junction and rolled down an embankment. The dead and injured were from South Jersey, Philadelphia and vicinity. Nearly all of the injured were removed to this city.
John F. Walt, an operator who has been in the service of the company for twenty-four years, is in a state of collapse in his home at Hammonton, N. J. He is under the surveillance of the state police. The engineer of the express, Walter Westcott, is dead. He was killed instantly.
One of the Connecticut Light Guard Shot!
Alexandria, June 16. — A reconnaissance of the Loudoun and Hampshire railroad was made to-day, two miles beyond Vienna, which is fifteen miles north of Alexandria. The train was under charge of Col. Powers, accompanied by the first Connecticut troops, under the command of Brigadier General Tyler. On the return of the train, when two miles this side of Vienna, a man fired on the train from ambush, wounding George Busbee, of the Connecticut Light Guards.