The Runaway Gravel Car That Nearly Killed a Switchman
A gravel car cut loose on Tacoma's steep Pacific Avenue grade, tearing down the street at sixty miles an hour until a switchman leapt onto the engine's pilot to stop it — and was gravely hurt.
TACOMA, July 2 — Special. Early this evening a car being switched onto the sidetrack at the Tacoma Terminal Company ran away down the steep grade to the Pacific avenue. A switchman pursued it. The car crossed the avenue at sixty miles an hour. An approaching car struck Switchman Michael M. Dunn, on the front of the engine; he received a fall, and it was several cuts about the head, and may die. Switchman Hurley remained aboard and was injured in a slight collision.
“The car crossed the avenue at sixty miles an hour.”
Runaway rail cars on steep urban grades were a recurring hazard in young Tacoma, where tracks threaded straight through the commercial streets. The same Pacific Avenue grade is now a transit corridor, and the question of how fast heavy equipment moves through a city center still gets argued at council meetings.
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