C&S 12 wreck photo on ebay

[Todd Hackett]

Does anyone recognize this wreck? It's from a magic lantern slide that was on ebay briefly. It was a buy-it-now, and I bought it then, but the seller cancelled the transaction with the reason listed as "I'm out of stock or the item is damaged." It looks like there was another locomotive in front of #12 that pushed past combine 28.

[Jim Courtney]

What a great photograph, Todd!

I believe this is the wreck that occurred on July 8, 1914, just outside of Denver, between the eastbound Fish Train (no, 73), returning to Denver with an early Monday morning arrival from Grant, and the westbound morning Morrison train (no. 60).

This was a head on collision, with the Fish Train in violation of the Morrison train's time. The locomotive on the Fish Train was number 70, while number 12 was on the Morrison job.

The wreck is discussed in the Klingers' C&S Platte Canon Memories . . . , page 10.

Here is another view of the carnage, also from the Klingers' book:




A lot of weekend fishermen are going to be late getting back to Denver and their jobs . . .

[ComoDepot]

Presumably all this was repaired, does not look like a high speed collision.

[Ken Martin]

Nice photo.

The Combine on the right is obviously 28, The combine behind engine 12 is 26.

The accident has an ICC report on the DOT online collections.

Ken Martin

[Todd Hackett]

I asked the seller why he cancelled, and it turned out to be a mix-up about his inventory, and this one had been previously sold.

[South Park]

Note that the 12 is buried into the deck of the tender of another
locomotive in the first photo, where in the fishtrain wreck, the
12 and the other loco are nose-to-nose, with the other tender still
behind the other loco.

[Todd Hackett]

South Park wrote

Note that the 12 is buried into the deck of the tender of another
locomotive in the first photo, where in the fishtrain wreck, the
12 and the other loco are nose-to-nose, with the other tender still
behind the other loco.

It's possible that the fish train article photo is from a low enough perspective that you can't see #70's tender behind the locomotive. The momentum of the fish train probably pushed the tender of #70 past the locomotive after #12 pushed #70 off the rails. The position and features of #12 match too well between the photos for these to be different incidents.

[Wayne Taylor]

Also notice that in the grainy photo the wreck appears to be directly over a large culvert and in the clear photo (taken from opposite side of track) there is no evidence of the culvert.  On the other hand, how many head on wrecks was #12 involved in?