Category: Bill Farrell

October 2004, with a full moon high in the southeast sky. There were three CSX locomotives making their way south on the main line through northern Christian County. As the trio of C-40-8’s struggled to pull their heavy load of coal south the sound of their diesel engines crackled through the crisp night air.

As the heavy train approached the East Princeton Street (Highway 800) grade crossing in Crofton. The crossing gates reacted to the CSX coal drag with red flashing lights as the lead locomotive gave a loud blast on its deep throated horn. The sound of the horn broke the roar of the diesel engines as the train passed over the East Princeton Street crossing in the sleeping rural community. 

It so happens that a local resident of Crofton got caught by the lumbering train as it made its way south to unload the cars filled with black diamonds. He later reported as he sat in his car as the coal drag passed by him, he noticed a dark human like figure clinging to the ladder on one of the coal hoppers. He later remarked, “it must have been a hobo heading south to a warmer climate for the winter”. 

Then with a sudden leach and the sound of twisting, banging metal the hoppers started to react violently as the sound of the coal cars slamming into each other’s couplers. The long train automatically went into emergency as a dozen cars filled with coal started to be tossed around like some child’s toys. The black cars were heaved up into the air like the wind blowing so many autumn leaves into a pile. There were cars buried half way down into the earth, while other came to rest on top of one another. Cars were bent and twisted laying on their sides with pieces of rail sticking through them like a tooth picks in a sandwich. A large dark gray cloud covered the bent and twisted cars as they oozed their valuable contains on to the track side ballast. Before the derailed cars could come to rest, they managed to takeout the newly installed but not yet operational south bound signal lights along the right of way. The sound of the grinding metal coming to a sudden stop brought many of the residents out of their track side homes to see what all the noise was about. To their sleepy, tired eyes they saw the horrifying sight of a dozen coal hoppers piled up and twisted in the late October night air. This is something you live with when your home is close to a mainline track but you never think it will ever happen to you or your community. The next morning the residents who were able to go back to sleep got up to a flurrying of activity in their town. CSX personnel along with R.J. Corman emergency railroad services had arrived sometime during the early morning. The tracks had to be cleared of all the rubble and debris that was created during the derailment. The railroad would stand to lose over two million dollars a day for each day the line remained closed. Work crews started immediately clearing the right of way as the sun was coming up in the east. Inspection teams from CSX were on hand to see which hoppers might be salvaged from the twisted mass covering the once pristine rails.

As a road foreman and his team made their way around a bent and crushed hopper, which had spilled it’s contains, they noticed a shoe sticking out from under one of the coal hoppers. Immediately they started with shovels to free the person under the mountain of black rocks and bent steel. They were to late the car had fallen on a hobo’s body crushing him. They brought in a piece of heavy equipment and were able to lift the coal car high enough to pull the man’s lifeless body out from under the twisted, jagged metal. When all present looked at the limp corps, they couldn’t help but to notice the hobo had been decapitated in the wreckage earlier that night. The county coroner arrived, took one look at the mans mangled, headless, coal covered body and pronounced him as dead. The coroner then checks the hobo’s coal dust filled pockets for identification with none to be found. In a matter of seconds, the lifeless remains would become known as, “The Headless Hobo”. Shortly after the coroner was finished with his examination. Emergency services had the man’s body on a stretcher and in the back of a pickup truck for transportation to the Hopkinsville morgue.

The word of the headless hobo spread among the crews that were working the wreckage. Everyone was told to be on the lookout for the head of the unfortunate man that was hitching a ride south with CSX. Every man working on that derailment was very apprehensive about what might be around the next pile of spilled coal. No one wanted to come up on or discover the decapitated head from the hobo. The railroad crews worked several days restoring service to the mainline in order to get it open once more. It took close to six weeks before CSX could get all the broken and derailed coal cars completely clear from the right of way.

The derailment brought people from far away just to see how horrendous and violent the incident must have been for the few seconds it lasted. During the time span of clean up, different railroad crews were on sight but no one ever found the hobo’s head. Surely it must have been buried under one of those huge piles of coal and debris that was created by the derailment. Then crushed and pushed down into the rock and soil by wheels or tracks of heavy equipment working the site. Years later motorist on highway 41, CSX locomotive engineers and Crofton locals have reported a strange sighting in the area of the derailment. These sightings can only be seen at night in the fall of the year. It appears to be a fiery ball of molten steel about the size of a basketball racing down the tracks south of the Brown Street grade crossing in the area of the fatal derailment. Many CSX locomotive engineers and conductors have seen the ball of fire out run their speeding locomotives. Then all at once it jumps over to the siding and races back up the tracks from where it started. Many people have seen this phenomenon but no one can scientifically explain what is happening out on the tracks in this little rural community. If you reunited with his body”.    

The moral of this tale is, “You Can Get Ahead with CSX”.

By Bill Farrell, Chapter Treasurer

On Thursday the 6th of February, Ricky Bivins and Bill Farrell drove to Crofton, Kentucky to make a presentation of two hundred dollars. These funds were presented to the Crofton City Council to be used for their War Memorial Park. If you have never been to this small community alongside of the CSX track in Northern Christian County at night, you should. This community is on the upswing with new businesses and civic improvements all along highway 41. The most noticeable is the new War Memorial Park which was completed about eighteen months ago. If you drive through at night you can’t miss it, clean, neat, and all lite up.

After we made the presentation of the check, we were invited to say a few words on behalf of our chapter and NRHS. Ricky did a great job of thanking their city council for all they do in allowing the chapter to have our annual picnic on Crofton City property each fall. One of the biggest assets we get is, the use of the restrooms in city hall. Mayor Danny Lacy and the entire city council were very appreciative of the check and made it known that the Western Kentucky Chapter members were always welcome to the City of Crofton.

An idea was brought forth to the members of their council that were present. The idea of a small railroad museum dedicated to the preservation of L&N and the CSX railroads. It was pointed out that the city of Crofton was in a prime location for a venue of this type. The fact that the city is divided by the main line of CSX makes it a perfect location for a museum and “railfanning”. We pointed out that I-169 is just three quarters of a mile from downtown Crofton. Spring, summer and fall would be perfect for tourism in this little North Christian community. The Western Kentucky Chapter members have enough L&N, and CSX artifacts that we could fill most any building they might want to use. Of course, any item used in the museum would be on loan by the owner.  We offered our assistance in this effort if the city wanted to explore the possibilities in the future.

As a group we talked for about twenty-five or thirty minutes. All people present seemed very interested in a project of this nature. Ricky and myself pointed out the possibilities of obtaining money for such a project through local and federal grants. At one point I turned to Ricky and said “we have to leave; we are using up all their council meeting time”. Before leaving Mayor Lacy brought up an idea of having a structure erected that would resemble the old Crofton depot so people could sit and watch CSX rolling stock pass through their fair city.

As Ricky and I stepped out into the cold snow filled air, we too were excited about the possibilities for this small town. As we made our way through the parking lot, I couldn’t help notice the excitement in my comrade’s voice. I asked him would he be willing to work on such a project, of course the answer was, yes. As I turned my SUV south on highway 41, I couldn’t help to think about Mayor Lacey’s idea of building a permanent structure for people to sit under. Then it hit me, what about the old Sebree, Kentucky depot? What a perfect fit for Crofton, a station built by L&N brought back to life beside its former main line.

Just before Ricky and I departed for the evening I told him, “the ball is now in Crofton’s hands, let’s see what they do with it”.

Photos by Bill Farrell and & Blair Terry

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The Northern type locomotive (4-8-4) was moved from Centennial Park in Nashville to the Nashville & Western Railroad Tracks about a mile northeast of the park. The locomotive and tender were loaded up Friday on flat beds for the move early Sunday morning. Picture 1 is of the 576 leaving Centennial Park, the flat bed is self-propelled. Photo 2 is of her tender minus it’s trucks. The trucks were taken on to the Nashville & Western RR earlier. Photo 3 was shot on Charlotte Pike, as the locomotive moved slowly toward it’s unloading point. Photo 4 is of Bill Farrell & Blair Terry as they followed the 576 down Charlotte Pike. Finally, photo 5 is a shot of both the locomotive and tender as they make a left turn off Charlotte on to 12th Ave. North.

At Crofton (KY) a North bound mixed freight (is) pulled by  Canadian Nation unit 8102 and assisted by Union Pacific 2513. The train lost its air and went into an emergency stop just North of Kelly, KY. (Photo by Bill Farrell)

 

This is unbelievable, the past two years have passed so fast. At our next meeting, we will be electing a new President for 2017. I believe the new slate of officers will serve our organization well for the upcoming year. I would like to wish them well in their leadership going forward.

If you have not received an email from Steve Miller about the Christmas Party at his house, then you need to contact him very soon. He needs a head count and what you plan to bring as a covered dish. The get together is on Saturday December 3rd, any time after 1 o’clock pm. Steve and his wife have just recently added on to their house and we should have more than enough room for the party. If you are not sure where Steve resides it is 1420 Billy Goat Hill Road, Hopkinsville, KY. His phone number is 270 839-7936, please get in touch with him.

James Kemp will have a signup sheet for the Christmas show work schedule. I talked with him last week and he indicated we have several empty shifts. We need for our membership to turn out for this event and help make it a big success. Please contact James soon and get on  the work schedule. The show will start on December 12, 2016, 6:00 pm.

Along with the Christmas show we are having a raffle for a Lionel Ready to Run Train Set with remote control. The set is the New York Central Early Bird freight, value– $390.00. By now you should have received an envelope with three raffle tickets. We are asking each member to sell the three ticket in order to cover our Liability Insurance Policy. The Raffle tickets are 5.00 dollars each and only 150 were printed. If you need additional tickets, please contact me. We will have tickets available for sale at the show in the Mall. If you are having a hard time selling the tickets bring them to your work shift at the Mall. You can tell anyone you sell a raffle ticket to that I (Bill Farrell) have a standing offer of 75.00 dollars to anyone who doesn’t want the train set (if they win the raffle). Once you have sold all your raffle tickets please get the right side of the ticket along with the money to; Bill Farrell or mail it to me at, P.O. Box 457, Hopkinsville, Kentucky 42241. We need to have all stubs in by December 23rd for the raffle.  

Our photo contest is now paying off. Jim Pearson will have a sample of the calendar at the November 21st meeting. I think he will be taking orders so that the calendar can be printed before January 1st. If you are going to have a train calendar in your house or office, why not the Western Kentucky Chapter/NRHS. Of course, all the pictures were taken by members of our organization, now that’s cool. You might plan on purchasing more than one.

The slate of officers for 2017 are as followed; President Ricky Bivins, Vice President Steve Miller, Secretary Wally Watts, Treas. William Farrell, Chapter Rep. to NRHS Will Kling. We will open the floor for any other nominations just before the slate is presented. If there are no other nominations then we can accept the slate by acclamation.

Bill Farrell, President    

 

We have several things to cover in this column, so let’s get started.

First, the club picnic went well and everyone who attended seemed to have a great time. The only down side was the heat and the flies.  I now know why the club moved it to the second week in October. I don’t know if I want to cook or freeze. The membership will have to think about a date for next year’s picnic. The location is just great and I can’t think of another place along the main line that would better.

Next, we have just finished the last photo contest of the year. I hope everyone has enjoyed getting out and taking pictures of trains in action. Our plan is to take the top three pictures from each contest and develop a club calendar for 2017. This calendar will be available to the membership as well to individuals on line. Jim Pearson said we might make a little money on this project from the online sales. I hope all our club members plan on purchasing at least one calendar for the new year.

Third, in our September meeting we found out that the liability insurance policy had tripled in cost. I have been in touch with a company in Madisonville who is supposed to give us a new quote. With a little luck maybe we can get the cost of a new policy down to something the club can manage.

Finally, we have nominations for our 2017 club officers in the October meeting. We have many qualified individuals in the membership who could serve our organization well. Take a little time and think of someone that might do a good job as an officer of our organization. The positions we are nominating for are; President, Vice President, Sec/Treas. and Officer at Large.

Until the meeting– get out, enjoy the weather and chase a train. Oh, and when you see Bill Thomas tell him he is doing a great job with the “PennyRail” news letter.

Bill Farrell, President