Tragedy on the Yakima River Line
A Northern Pacific train derails near Bristol, claiming the lives of a Tacoma engineer and fireman.
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.
Saturday afternoon, Engineer Franklin I. Hammond and Fireman John Johnson of Tacoma started East with Burlington train No. 16 on the Northern Pacific railway. Today, the mangled remains of Hammond followed the body of Johnson to this city to testify to the incidents of a disastrous wreck Saturday evening a mile from Bristol. The train was rushing around a sharp curve near Bristol, between Cle Elum and Ellensburg, when the engine jumped the rails, turned over, and was rolled under the heavy train following. What caused the accident has not been determined. The train bumped along for a hundred yards before it finally stopped in confusion. The baggage car was turned crosswise, the mail car slid down the bank into the Yakima river, and a car of fresh fish was smashed. Fireman Johnson was found dead in a pool of water. Engineer Hammond was located Sunday morning under the engine tender; he was a man of family, leaving five children at his home on East Thirtieth Street.
“The train bumped along for a hundred yards before it finally stopped in confusion.”
Train derailments remain a persistent safety concern for Pacific Northwest rail corridors, which still see heavy freight traffic through mountain passes. The loss of life in industrial accidents like this defined the dangers of early 20th-century railroad work, a stark contrast to modern automated safety standards.
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