The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 6, 1896, Page 25

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, DECEMBER 6, HEROES OF THE ENGINE CAB. :{o:\/\). It Feels to Hold the Throttle at 112 : Miles an Hour. ©his Js the story of bow it feéls to drive an gngine at its utmost spe d, gathered from -the lips of the drivers. Various pessons have from time to time related : sensations while on board a railway | n traveling at the rate of a mile a nute, but much more interesting are the facts as to the sensations of the men n'the cab of the engine, who face death nd’danger, to whom peril is an every-day companion, and who turn their backs on éar. 1tis one thing tositin a parlor car and £ag2 ‘at the landscape flying by as if it were a panorama instead of nature itself. together a aifferent matter to look Jut.the window of an engine cab far ahead swh the gleaming rails, not kpowing at of tremendous ¢ happen, knowing that a turn the great, living, machine into a total wreck | rty seconds. For this reason, it is of more than pass- ing’interest to know what the engineer thinks, how he , and whether be really | &' made dif t from other men by a life | \p.comb and monotony, a| Ty that rerves | the same The sooty face engine cab glide into he platform may’give no sign of | n ten minutes nd awful, has | ry apt to be the | ineer becomes | sthe great boiler seems. | sive and death and danger | nhand. A splendid nerve for an engineer. H at the rate of 112 Only once in the entire roads has the feat ever been ‘ The bearers of this record | ne £99. that most famous of Ameri- and iis driver, John | Il happened on the tracks of | k Central, between Syracuse | ). This is what tives, | neer | vel along the rails at the rate of hour is as nea: like flying as | I can think of. When we got ie of Syracuse and began to crowd ook just as if we bad been Il you I feit excited as we v. put on steam, and I knew we fe.getting closer and closer to a point eed-that had never been passed hy g r and faster we went, | ing like a trip-hammer. | d the towns on each side ack don’t seem like anything but . * It seemed to me asif everything had gone out of my head but just the pewer to watch that steam gauge and to trace that speed. When we | agited the 100-mile-an-hour pace I knew #li'records had been broken. 0Old 999 an Jotin'Hogan had- gone faster than ar érigine and engineer had ever traveled. I g of S ST N\ Sy 1 LIGHTNING EXPRESS, 112 Ml{_ES AN HOUR. felt-a sense of exhilaration and pride such -as'] .never experienced before nor since. Thén came the desire to see what we | really could do. 1t seemed to me asif I| would almost burst. Isaw that every | condition was favorable to a wonderful run, and I had a good excuse for it, for we were a little behind time. ©A little more pressure and the engine jumped forward as if it werealive. The rush of wina outside the cab was so like a ;:alé that I felt we must be in a storm. ©ne hundred and five, six, seven, eight, then nine and ten mifes. 1 began to won- ger where on earth we were going to, whether we ever could find a limit, and I was 0 intoxicated with the success that we had achieved that I made up my mind to do all that was possible. At last there came a moment when I Knew we were doing all that we could and T'can’t tell Low sorry it mede me feel to find that limit. We were running at the Tate of 112 miles an hour and my heart sank when after about five miles we had to'slow down to the hundred rate; but oud as 1t may seem I did not realize what had been done until we came toa dead stop in Buffalo, and then it all came over me. Say, I wag as weak as a cat. That | how satisfactory it is. | engine, within a train’s length of me, I : mmgmnlié:.!m;ffz/i is how it feels to ride at the rate of 112 miles an hour.” The night run of the Empire State Ex- press from New York to Albany is one of the best known and most trying runs out of New York City. This isthe star tran of the New York Central. Nothing must be permitted to interfere with its progress. It must be on time. All these things the engineer has to’ face when he pulls the | throttlé at Forty-second street, and the run toward the Harlem River begins. He knows he must make from fifty-three to sixty-five miles an hour, and that accident is to be avoided under any and all circum- stances. William Marley makes this run hree times one week and four another. “Nerve?” said he, when he talked of the tasic thathhe accomplished so often. “Why 1 haven’t got any atall, if you mean the force that makes you tremble. I guess I have got some of thé other Yind orI wouldn’t be running this engine wn't mind telling you that a man in this pu.'e ness wants to forget all about the fact that he's got nerves. They would only interfere with his work. On the run like the onel have, all a man has to do is to watch his engine and go ahead on time. ‘When a man is in the cab of his engine he has eyes for only one thing, and that 18 possible danger. I know that I am al- ways on the lookout for it. and I always would be, whether 1 was running the Em- te Express or a local one cnly three miles out. *There 1s a sense of responsibility felt by locomotive engineers unlike that which s upon a man in any other business. he fact that one man is responsible for the lives of hundreds is enough to make him careful. On a fast train like I run the engineer always has that sense of get- ting somewhere quick! nd Ican'ttell you Then he always has the feeling of power. Somehow it just comes to him from the big powerful | engine that doesn’t stop for anything. | “When Iam running an engine I sel- Gom think of what may be on the track abead of me. Why, if I should see my own mother on the rails in front of my would know that no power but that of God | Almighty could save her. Once anything that lives gets within a certain distance before the engine it simply means instant death for whatever it may be. Iam sure that a wrain going at the rate of sixty miles an hour could never be stopped within its length unless it was a much longer train than the Empire State Ex- press. I never think of the possibility of an accident when I am on a run. You see they are not pleasant things to havein your mind anyway,-these possible disas- ters, and I always figure there is time enough to think about them when they | come, if come they must. *“When a men sees wiaat seems certain death staring him in the face as he sits | on his seat in the engine cab he doesn’t | feel at all. He merely realizes everything | { engine. | witnesses. SEEKING THE NORTH POLE rails. Yor an instant I seemed paralyzed and was as if turned to stone. I remember glancing at my fireman, and his facejwas gray. Mechanically I shut’off the steam and put on the airbrake. I just called to the fireman to jump when over went the engine on her side and both of us wer thrown a dozen feet from the wreck. “When we picked ourselves up we found that the only damage done was to the I turned to the fireman and said: “Jim, what were your first thoughts when she jumped?’ He replied: ‘I thought of my mother and then wondered what was going to become of me if I was killed.’ “As for myself, I thought in the few sec- onds that the affair lasted of everything that ever happened to me during my en- tire life. Perhaps I skipped a few things, but it didn’t seem so. It was the only accident I ever had, and Idon’t mind tell- ing you that I never wantto bein another. It did not seem to affect me beyond a general shaking up, and although I-have heard of men losing their nerve after an accident, 1do not think I did so, for I ran IN THE ELECTRIC 1896. 25 ICE-CRUSHER. over that line a long time after that with- out any accident. Nevertheless, I always felt a certain sense of reiief when 1 had taken the last car of my train safely over that switch.” These facts show that the life of the en- gineer is never devoid of sensation, for there is sensation in expectation and both are included in uncertainty. Alil of these elements enter 1nto the life of the man who holds the throttle, and, holding the throttie, has in his keeping the lives of thousands. PACED BY A GALE HE SMASHED ALL RECORDS. A Daring Wheelman Whirled in the Teeth of a Storm Rides a Wonderful Mile in Fifty-Eight Seconds. ; The bicycle has just proved itself speed- ier than a hurricane. Stanley M. Barrows, a young Deuver rider, is the cyclist who traveled the fastest mile that any wheel- man over rode—>58 3-5 seconds. A mile in lessthan a minute. That isa record which few limited express trains equal. Yet it was proved to be correct by competent It is not often that a wheel- man has a gale or a hurricane act as pace- | maker, but that was young Barrows’ ex- perience, and, odd though it may seem, he left the pace-maker behind him from start and justdoes all he can to avert the | 2/ danger. He has no time to feel atall un- der such circumstances.’’ One of the old-timers of the Pennsyl- vania is Ned Perkins, who, in addition to bis other virtues, acknowledges having been 1n an accident. I guess that nine- tenths of all the railroad men in the coun- try have been mixed up in some sort of an accident in the course of their expe- rience,” said he. *I had one once which took me as near death as I care to go until the actual end comes. I was running a local out of Philadelphia on the western division and had a good fireman, buta poor engine. She was a cranky machine | if ever there was one, and the men in the | roundhouse were always joking me about the ‘mule,’ as she was calied. “I had been pretty lucky and was con- gratulating myself upon avoiding acci- dents, when one day my turn came, I was a little behind time and had just got fairly started on my run. I was going along at a forty-mile speed when we came in sight of a sule track. Ihad been over that switch hundreds of times and gave it no thought, until suddenly the engine gave a jump and began to pitch and toss and tears thinz up generally. “In a secoud I krew we were off the to finish. in riding a quarter in 15 2.5 seconds. , I was satisfied by this performance that I could get the mile in a minute flat or better. No- vember 2 we had another windstorm and I again tried the mile. This time the wind shifted around to my side justasI arrived at the course and the best I could | do was 1:221.5. “On November 5 the wind blew strongly and direct from the west. About ncon the wind weas at the highest, and I se- cured two timers and three witnesses and went out to the course, which is consider- ably higher than the highest building in thecity. ‘The course over which I rode was about helf a mile east of the course which’ Dennis used. On the course over half of the course over which I rode there is a drop of over fifty feet and a climb of vrobably twenty feet in the last half. The road was in excellent shape, with the ex- ception of the stretch of adobe near the half, which was somewhat rough jorabout thirty feet. I started about 100 yards back of the beginning of the mile and was under full speed by the time I reached the mark. All went well until 1 reached the adobe stretch, when the jar threw me out of the saddle, but I was going at such a rate it was for an instant only. My feet were firmly fastened to the pedals and.it was impossible for me to be thrown from thc wheel, the only dancer being a breakage or a collision with some unlooked-for ob- ject. The time of the start was 1:07:31 3-5 and the finish was 1:08:30 1-5. “I rode a track-racing bicycle weighmg twenty pounds and fitted with road-racing tires. It was geared to 120 inches. 1am inclined to think this record will stand for along time. Yours, very truly, “StanLEY M. BARROWS.” Mr. Barrows only tells a part of the story. To him the story consists of what he knew of hi8 ride as he made it on his wheel. There is another view, which is equaliy interesting, and that is the view of the persons who saw the race. They say it was a sight worth going a long way to see. In their opinion Barrows could race with a bullet with fair chance of suc- cess. While the ground on which the ride was taken is known as a plain, it is meref‘ ly so by comparison, for the course that Barrows rode is down hill the first half mile and up hill the second half, although the grace is not so very difficult. The tape was laid at each end of the mitle, and Barrows whbeeled back 100 yards before he started on the ride that made him fam- ous. The wind was blowing a hurricane and when he went over the tape where Beri Yardley, the timekeeper, stood he seemed to have been condensed into a flash. The stop-watch registered 1:073-5. By the time Yardley managed to get his eye on Barrows the rider was out of hearing. He had passed the wind. The hurricane which should have been blowing him This happened near Montelair, Colo., very near to Denver, on a plain where the wind bad full sweep. The wind always blows in Denver, and when it decides to take an extra spurt it’s a wind worth thinking about. It was a wind like this that was blowing the day Barrows went out to break the record. If that wind blew in most States east of Kansas it would be considered & very respectable hurricane, but in Colorado it is known as a plains zephyr. Mr. Barrows has taken the wrouble to relate his experience on this oc- casion and to tell why he made the effort. This is his story, in his own language, juss as it was written and signed by himself: “To the Editor: On the 27th of last March I rode a straightaway mile in 1:31, A few minutes aiter I made the ride M. 0. Dennis rode a mile over the same course in 1:11 3-5. Ever since then I have been awaiting a favorable opportunity to lower the record made by Dennis. On September 25 a Leavy windstorm came down from the mountains west of here and I secured timers and witnesses and went out to the course, which 1s situated on a course six miles from Denver. Owing to the poor condition of the roads I was unable to try for the mile, but succeeded along before it, could not keep up with him. Instead of being driven by the wind be was in reality acting as pace- maker for it and had to meet a lively breeze caused by his tremendous momen- tum. Think ot beating a hurricane. Was ever such a feat accomplished by a human being before? Old Boreas must have hung his head in shame. Before the mamat the other end of the mile realized what was happening, some- thing went over the tape-line in front of him, and he stopped his watch mechani- cally. When he managed to turn his eyes down the road to see what it was, he dis- covered Barrows at least a quarter of a mile away, apparently vedaling along for sll he was worth, Really he was trying to stop, but there are easier things to bring to a standstill than a picycle that has been traveling a mile 1n less than a minute; Frank C. Wolff, who'was the timekeeper at the last end of the mile, had got his breath by this time, .and looked at his watch. It registered 1:0815. This meant that the mile had been traveled in 58 3.5 seconds. & After a while Barrows managed to re- turn from his over-time trip, and found that he had done what he had hoped to do, and had broken every recora that anybody had ever tried to make on a wheel. No one who saw the race was sur- prised. Not one of them had ever be- lieved such speed was in a wheel. It must be remembered, too, that Barrows beat the harricane, therefore it cannot be said which Dennis rode there is a climb of | about thirty feet in the mile. In the first4 Waterford to the chair of professor of is just like that famous 112 miles an hour run of engine 999 of the New York Cen- tral. Nobody ever believed it could be done until it was accomplished. This record of Barrows’ was witndssed by Cuarles Inglin, Phillip Snowden and Louis Snowden, besides the t:mekeepers. It is not official. It never will be con- sidered so. That does not alter the fact that the record has been made, and though it may be declared informal and not to be considered by tbe professional record breaker, it is, just the same, the fastest mile that any one ever made on a wheel. Many Still Speak Gaelic. A new vl'an for reaching the north vole bas just been conceived. That point sur- rounded by mystery is to be reached by means of an electric ice-destroyer,. at- tached to the prow of a steam vessel 150 feetlong. The originator of the idea is Mr. Warrington Baden-Powell, eider brother of Bir George Baden-Powell, M. P., and Major Baden- Powell, who led the pioneers in the late Ashantee eapedition. An expedition is now being planned, but whether it will travel under British or American auspices has not been decided. The peculiar craft by which it is be- lieved the success for which millions of money have been spent and many lives sacrificed will be achieved is to b like nothing ever constructed, 1n its entirety. It resembles ‘in a degree the ocean whaleback. The deck covering is of steel, studded with heavy rivets, the whole specially drawn and welded with the idea of withstanding extreme tem- perature, the sort that is naturally ex- pected to exist in the vicinity of.the pole. This is about the only resemblance, so far as any striking feature is concerned, to any other craft which was ever planned. In fact, it is noticeable for the many radical changes and departures from all previous theories of marine architecture. At the apex of the bow is a curious screw, not unlike a series of circular saws. This ice-destroyer, for that is what it really is, constitutes the means for forcing a passage through ice floes which never could be accomplished continuously and successfully except by some such means. As the ship lies in the water this screw saw is observed as projecting several feet and partially out of the water. In appear- ance this curious contrivance resembles more than anything else a huge screw. As stated, it has teeth like a saw cutin the edges of its thread. The shait or cen- ter of this screw is a massive affair of steel, pointed at one end so that it may be operated as a ram. It is the idea of the inventor to send the craft abead at an ice- pack or floe under a full head of steam, with the propelier at the stern and the screw at the bow, both working together, although one receives its power from an electric engine, while the power of the other comes from an engine driven by steam. The rapidly revolving screw and ram combined will first crash into the ice im- A CRAFT OF WHIRLING BLADES To Cleave lts Way Through Ice Barriers to the North Pole. ful. fully 1500 horsepower. The latest principle in the way of fuel will be fol- lowed, and the flame which heats t e boil- ers will have as its source petrolenm. Well forward in the bow is placed the powerful engine which runs the ice-crush- ing screw saw. Huge electric motors and powerful gearing are the characteristics of this engine, which will only be used when it is necessary to cut a channel through the ice. T.e electricity is supplied by an immense dynamo, which is driven by the main shaft. Below and all round the electric engine-room are the steel tanks in which the petroleum is stored. These ex- tend well under the cabin and living quar- ters of tne crew. In the after section of the hull, about a third of the way from the stem, is located the engine which runs the propeller. The boiler-room is just in front. Storerooms in which can be carried provisions for three vears and a half and petroleum tanks occupy the after portion of the ship. The living quarters of the crew and members of the party who accompany the expedition areamidships, partly above and partly below water. Here are store- rooms for delicate scientific instruments, m.edicines and articles required for con- stant daily use. The turret or deckhouse and quariers are thoroughly piped from the boilers, and thusany degree of warmth can be maintained regardless of the weather ontside. A constant supply of fresh air is obtained in the boiler and en- gine rooms, down in the body of the ship, below the waters’ surface, by means of forced drafr, which sends the air down two large ventilators on either side of the smokestack. The steering apparatus of the boat will be the very best that ingenuity can devise and money purchase, It wiil be so ar- ranged t. at thé vessel can be steered from any section of the cabin. S8till another | peculiarity of the craft is the odd con- struction and position of the propeller. It is set, not at the extreme stern, but a little forward and beneath a sort of pro- jection which, however, is all below the surface. The idea of thisis to protect the rudder ana propeller as much as possible from icejams, and to further add to this the blades of the propeller are thicker than is ordinarily the case and sharper on the edges in order that they may cut A new appointment has been made from Guelic in Maynooth College, Ireland. The new appointee is a member of the Gaelic League of Dublin, and was the first editor of the Archwological Journal of Water- ford. The opinion is very general that Gaelic is an extinct ianguage, or one nearly extinct, and the labors of the Gaelic Society in New Yurk to revive its use have lent some color to that opinion. Nevertheless, as figures show, the Gaelic tongue is very tenacious, and, according to tne last reports, is spoken, though not exclusively, by 1,000,000 persons in the British Isles—600.000 in Ireland, 350,000 in Wales, and 220,000 in Scotland. Though English is the official language of all these countries, the popularity of English increases slowly despite the dis- advantage under which those who use Guelic labor, that of having no established grammar and no recognition in an official way. Gaelic fulfills the colloquial require- ments of the furmers and fishermen in the counties remote from the large cities, somewhat as the Basque language con- tinues to be popular in the northern proy- inces of Spain. In this country Gaelic has made little headway, though many patriotic Irish- men have by various methods endeavored to acquaint others less patriotic with its advantages, While the nse of most Euro- pean languages has about doubled in seventy-five years, five times as many per- sons speak English as did in 1820, —————— London’s population increases by 70,000 each year. BATTLE WITH A BUCK. pelled by a power that is tremmendous when the size of the craft is considered. Then 1t will saw and bore its way through the pack or floe, throwing the ice cpward and backward. It might be thought that the flying ice and snow would injure or bur- den the vessel, and to avoid anything of this nature a shield has been constructed which will answer the dual purpose of withstanding the heavy shocks of the waves and the bombardment of flying ice. This shield is a curved aftair, running from a point just forward from the deck- house backward at an angle of forty-fiyé degrees, It is made of heavy boiler iron, sheets of which are riveted together. ‘While only built for moderate speed this craft is especially designed for batter- ing and ramming ice, and its pro- pelling engines, which will be com- pound triple exparsion oues, are to be correspondingly heavy and power- A WONDERFUL MILE, A © that the hurricane helped him along. It PACED BY A GALE. rather than break any ice cakes which may come within the sweep. Marine engineers and explorers slike are watching the construction .of this unique craft with no little interest. Many opinions have been advanced regarding the possibilities of this vessel. The in- ventor, however, is confident that he has { at last reacned a solution of that most puzzling problem which bas occupied the attention of scientists and navigators for centuries. It is considered by all odds the most novel method of reaching the pole that was ever originated. M. G. L. Pesce, a French civil engineer, has conceived the idea of reaching the Mecca of Arctic ex- plorers by means of a submarine boat, which Le would have travel 160 feet be- neath the surface ot the sea. Most per- sons, however, would prefer to travel on top of the water, and that is why Mr. Baden-Powell’s idea is considered worthy of consideration and not chimerical. It is not among the 1mpossibilities that at the proper season in 1897 this strange craft may journey northward. Who wiil man her, under whose guidance she will go, is something for the future to decide, It is quite likely that if she does go she will float the American flag. Battle With a Royal Buck. William M. Stover, one of the lessees o the Dovle mine at Horseshoe Bend, on tbe Stanislaus River, was an unwilling participant in a thrilling adventure last week. The Sonora Democratic Banner says that he shot ata larze buck which was standing in bold relief on the crest of a hill, The bullet went straight, and the deer plunged forward and fell. Mr. Stover laid his rifle down and hastened to his fallen game for the -purpose of cutting its throat. Just as he reached the deerand leaned over to apply the knife the animal leaped to his feetand glared at Mr. Stover. Instantly the man seized the beast by the horns. That action terrified the buck. He made a plunge and down the steep sides of Devils Canvon he went, carrying the man with him. The deer was madly frightened, and Mr. Stover was more scared than the deer. He could not turn loose, and away went man and animal over rocks, bushes and briers. When near the bottom of the canvon the deer fell against a tree, ana before he could get up, being nearly exhausted by his terrible run, Mr. Stover grabbed a large piece of quartz rock and killed the animal by beat~ ing it on the head. Mr. Stover had his clothes badly torn, and his face and hands were scratched by the bushes like unto the results of a scrimmage with cats. He is unable to tell how he escaped serious if jury while going down the side of the rough hill at a break« neck speed. The deer took him on the jump every foot of the way. After the deer was dead an examination showed that the bullet had struck him square upon the horns near the head, which’causea him to fall over in a stunned conaition. ——— If a match is beid to a celluloid billiards ‘ball, the ball will catch fire and burn.