The Price of a Shoddy Crossing
A railroad conductor is killed in a derailment caused by an improperly filled track crossing.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
By an accident which occurred to a construction train on the Kalama branch of the Northern Pacific Railroad yesterday afternoon, D. Butler, conductor of the train, was thrown underneath the cars and instantly killed. Five cars were ditched and smashed. Besides Butler, there were on the train fifty Chinese laborers, two brakemen, the fireman and engineer, all of whom escaped without injury. The accident occurred at a road crossing near Kooky Point, about eighteen miles from this city. The space which is always left between the rails and planking for the flange of the car wheels was completely filled with a thick piece of plank, causing the car to leave the track. Whether it was placed there by ignorant persons or tramps for revenge, it is impossible to say. Butler’s body was brought to the city. The deceased was 43 years of age, having recently been connected with the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad in Colorado. He leaves a wife who was boarding with him at the Norton House.
“Butler’s body being nearly covered by the debris, his face and limbs being torn and mangled horribly.”
Railroad construction was the primary engine of Seattle's growth in the 1880s, but it was often a lethal industry. This tragic oversight at a crossing highlights the tension between the breakneck speed of infrastructure development and the safety of the workers tasked with building it.
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