FORTY YEARS IN A CAB.
Des Moines Register: Forty years is a long time to spend in an engineer's cab, but that is the record of William F. Hall of Fort Dodge, who has just been retired from the service of the Illinois Central railroad and has been placed upon the honorable pension list of that "heartless incorporation." Mr. Hall retires as the oldest engineer in the employ of that great railroad system, and his life's service has been quite remarkable. For no less than twenty seven-years of his long service Mr. Hall has pulled a passenger train over the Central between Sioux City and Fort Dodge, and before that he ran from Dubuque to Waterloo, when the road had not yet been built west of Fort Dodge. In an interview in the Fort Dodge Messenger, he says that when he first took his western run his engine would run miles and miles without a house in sight and the country was simply one vast prairie. Twice during his career this veteran has been in serious railroad wrecks, one of them being in the fall of 1872 when his train crashed into a freight train at Cedar Falls hill, six miles west of Waterloo. Just before they struck, Mr. Hall saw a woman and a small baby seated in the cupola of the train ahead and he felt certain they would be mashed to pieces. After the shock of the collision he made his way to the caboose to search for the mother and her babe, and was surprised to find them unhurt. That baby was Park Wise, who is now running a drug store in Cedar Falls. Mr. Hall says the worst experience he ever had was in 1881, when his train was fast in a snow bank for eight days and nights at Remsen hill, thirty-five miles east of Sioux City, when the thermometer registered 30 degrees below zero. There were forty passengers on the train, and it was with the greatest difficulty that enough food was foraged to keep them from starving to death. When Mr. Hall first ran an engine, air brakes were unheard of, and they used to shut off steam and begin to apply the hand brakes a mile before they came to a station. It has been a wonderful forty years of progress that Mr. Hall has seen, and it is very much to be doubted if the world ever sees another forty years like it.
The Fort Dodge Messenger
Fort Dodge, Iowa, USA
Tuesday, November 19th, 1901 edition
Page 2, column 3
Des Moines Register: Forty years is a long time to spend in an engineer's cab, but that is the record of William F. Hall of Fort Dodge, who has just been retired from the service of the Illinois Central railroad and has been placed upon the honorable pension list of that "heartless incorporation." Mr. Hall retires as the oldest engineer in the employ of that great railroad system, and his life's service has been quite remarkable. For no less than twenty seven-years of his long service Mr. Hall has pulled a passenger train over the Central between Sioux City and Fort Dodge, and before that he ran from Dubuque to Waterloo, when the road had not yet been built west of Fort Dodge. In an interview in the Fort Dodge Messenger, he says that when he first took his western run his engine would run miles and miles without a house in sight and the country was simply one vast prairie. Twice during his career this veteran has been in serious railroad wrecks, one of them being in the fall of 1872 when his train crashed into a freight train at Cedar Falls hill, six miles west of Waterloo. Just before they struck, Mr. Hall saw a woman and a small baby seated in the cupola of the train ahead and he felt certain they would be mashed to pieces. After the shock of the collision he made his way to the caboose to search for the mother and her babe, and was surprised to find them unhurt. That baby was Park Wise, who is now running a drug store in Cedar Falls. Mr. Hall says the worst experience he ever had was in 1881, when his train was fast in a snow bank for eight days and nights at Remsen hill, thirty-five miles east of Sioux City, when the thermometer registered 30 degrees below zero. There were forty passengers on the train, and it was with the greatest difficulty that enough food was foraged to keep them from starving to death. When Mr. Hall first ran an engine, air brakes were unheard of, and they used to shut off steam and begin to apply the hand brakes a mile before they came to a station. It has been a wonderful forty years of progress that Mr. Hall has seen, and it is very much to be doubted if the world ever sees another forty years like it.
The Fort Dodge Messenger
Fort Dodge, Iowa, USA
Tuesday, November 19th, 1901 edition
Page 2, column 3
FORTY YEARS IN A CAB.
Des Moines Register: Forty years is a long time to spend in an engineer's cab, but that is the record of William F. Hall of Fort Dodge, who has just been retired from the service of the Illinois Central railroad and has been placed upon the honorable pension list of that "heartless incorporation." Mr. Hall retires as the oldest engineer in the employ of that great railroad system, and his life's service has been quite remarkable. For no less than twenty seven-years of his long service Mr. Hall has pulled a passenger train over the Central between Sioux City and Fort Dodge, and before that he ran from Dubuque to Waterloo, when the road had not yet been built west of Fort Dodge. In an interview in the Fort Dodge Messenger, he says that when he first took his western run his engine would run miles and miles without a house in sight and the country was simply one vast prairie. Twice during his career this veteran has been in serious railroad wrecks, one of them being in the fall of 1872 when his train crashed into a freight train at Cedar Falls hill, six miles west of Waterloo. Just before they struck, Mr. Hall saw a woman and a small baby seated in the cupola of the train ahead and he felt certain they would be mashed to pieces. After the shock of the collision he made his way to the caboose to search for the mother and her babe, and was surprised to find them unhurt. That baby was Park Wise, who is now running a drug store in Cedar Falls. Mr. Hall says the worst experience he ever had was in 1881, when his train was fast in a snow bank for eight days and nights at Remsen hill, thirty-five miles east of Sioux City, when the thermometer registered 30 degrees below zero. There were forty passengers on the train, and it was with the greatest difficulty that enough food was foraged to keep them from starving to death. When Mr. Hall first ran an engine, air brakes were unheard of, and they used to shut off steam and begin to apply the hand brakes a mile before they came to a station. It has been a wonderful forty years of progress that Mr. Hall has seen, and it is very much to be doubted if the world ever sees another forty years like it.
The Fort Dodge Messenger
Fort Dodge, Iowa, USA
Tuesday, November 19th, 1901 edition
Page 2, column 3
Des Moines Register: Forty years is a long time to spend in an engineer's cab, but that is the record of William F. Hall of Fort Dodge, who has just been retired from the service of the Illinois Central railroad and has been placed upon the honorable pension list of that "heartless incorporation." Mr. Hall retires as the oldest engineer in the employ of that great railroad system, and his life's service has been quite remarkable. For no less than twenty seven-years of his long service Mr. Hall has pulled a passenger train over the Central between Sioux City and Fort Dodge, and before that he ran from Dubuque to Waterloo, when the road had not yet been built west of Fort Dodge. In an interview in the Fort Dodge Messenger, he says that when he first took his western run his engine would run miles and miles without a house in sight and the country was simply one vast prairie. Twice during his career this veteran has been in serious railroad wrecks, one of them being in the fall of 1872 when his train crashed into a freight train at Cedar Falls hill, six miles west of Waterloo. Just before they struck, Mr. Hall saw a woman and a small baby seated in the cupola of the train ahead and he felt certain they would be mashed to pieces. After the shock of the collision he made his way to the caboose to search for the mother and her babe, and was surprised to find them unhurt. That baby was Park Wise, who is now running a drug store in Cedar Falls. Mr. Hall says the worst experience he ever had was in 1881, when his train was fast in a snow bank for eight days and nights at Remsen hill, thirty-five miles east of Sioux City, when the thermometer registered 30 degrees below zero. There were forty passengers on the train, and it was with the greatest difficulty that enough food was foraged to keep them from starving to death. When Mr. Hall first ran an engine, air brakes were unheard of, and they used to shut off steam and begin to apply the hand brakes a mile before they came to a station. It has been a wonderful forty years of progress that Mr. Hall has seen, and it is very much to be doubted if the world ever sees another forty years like it.
The Fort Dodge Messenger
Fort Dodge, Iowa, USA
Tuesday, November 19th, 1901 edition
Page 2, column 3
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