Michigan City, Indiana
Train Wreck
February 18, 1947
TRAIN KILLS 13 RIDING IN BUS
Michigan City, Ind., Feb. 18 (AP) – Thirteen
men, members of a railroad section crew, were
killed and 16 other men were injured when a bus
carrying the railroad workers was struck by a
one-car Chicago, South Shore and South Bend
electric train yesterday at the Andry road
crossing five miles east of here.
The motorman and one passenger suffered minor
injuries but several of the 14 section workers
in the bus were injured seriously. Five of the
13 killed were negroes and all had lived here,
in Gary and Chicago.
Witnesses said bodies of the victims and
wreckage of the bus, owned by the railroad for
transportation of workers to and from their
jobs, were scattered several hundred feet along
the railroad right of way.
The Gettysburg Times, Gettysburg, PA 18 Feb 1947
MICHIGAN CITY, IND., Feb. 18 – (UP) –
Witnesses who saw a speeding one-car electric
train knife through a big bus load of railroad
workers, killing 13 persons and injuring 16
others, said today they could see no cause for
the accident.
The bus driver, Glenn
Morris, Michigan City, had an
unobstructed view for miles either way down the
track, but apparently did not see the train as
it bore down on the bus at 65 to 70 miles an
hour at a grade crossing five miles east of here
yesterday afternoon.
Ten of the injured still were in serious
condition at Clinic hospital here. All of those
killed and 14 of the injured were riding in the
bus. They were members of a railroad section
gang, mostly Negroes and Mexicans, who had just
completed work on another section of the
company’s right-of-way.
Morris
stopped the bus, witnesses said, and then
started slowly across the tracks in the path of
the Chicago, South Shore and South Bend
passenger car. The collision sliced the bus in
two, strewing bodies of the dead and the
screaming injured along the track. Morris’ body
was found 500 yards from the crossing.
W. E. Willard,
45, South Bend, motorman on the suburban train,
and one of his passengers were treated for
injuries at a hospital and released. The other
25 train passengers continued on they way after
transferring to another South Bend-to-Chicago
suburban train.
Willard said he had no time to stop. He said the
bus stopped then slowly moved into the path of
his train.
Ambulances rushed from hospitals and mortuaries
in a 25-mile radius. Attendants carried
stretchers up and down the tracks, sorting the
injured from the dead.
Traverse City Record Eagle, Traverse City,
MI 18 Feb 1947
Articles transcribed by
Loraine Jordan. Thank you, Loraine!
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