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For 40 Years, Crashing Trains Was One of America’s Favorite Pastimes
- hanniabu 7y ago> By 4 p.m., more than 40,000 people had arrived For anybody else that was curious, in 1896 $2*40k = $2.4M in 2019 http://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1896?amount=80000 http://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1896?amount=80000
- black_puppydog 7y agothat doesn't sound like an awful lot for two locomotives and logistics...?
- jopsen 7y agoProbably the locomotives had to be scrapped regardless. But putting down the rail sounds expensive, could it be that this was cheaper back then?
- jl6 7y agoProbably the track they laid would have needed to meet only the most basic requirements, with minimal consideration of reliability, safety, longevity, etc.
- bluGill 7y agoPutting down rail would have been cheap. Since it was one time use they could take a lot of shortcuts - who cares if the next frost will twist the rails when you will be done before the next frost.
- ataturk 7y agoPeople labored 16hrs a day for pennies. There was no OSHA and no governing bodies because there was nobody to complain about where the tracks were laid, etc.
- mywittyname 7y agoFor further context, I found a table of wages from that era (since the CPI calculator only goes back to 1913). https://libraryguides.missouri.edu/pricesandwages/1890-1899#collapseThree https://libraryguides.missouri.edu/pricesandwages/1890-1899#... It looks like $2 was the daily wage for many skilled people during that era. Train conductors made about $3 a day, a carpenter would get $2.05, and an unclassified worker made $1.65.
- nkurz 7y agoI think some people may be misintepreting this number. The actual event was free to attend. The $2 charge was not the admission price, but the cost of a round trip train ticket to the event from anywhere in Texas. Other possibly more reliable sources say that this ticket varied in price and was as much as $5 depending on origin: http://www.lsjunction.com/facts/crush.htm http://www.lsjunction.com/facts/crush.htm. So while there was a lot of economic activity associated with the crash, it wasn't the equivalent of a modern event with $2.4 million of gate receipts.
- bjourne 7y agoNot seldom can you measure how unequal a society is by the bizarreness of the leisure time of the upper classes.
- okusername 7y agoDid you even read the article? 40.000 people went there.
- Illniyar 7y agoI very much doubt this pastime was limited to the upper classes.
- leadingthenet 7y agoIt was 50 cents to attend and many tens of thousands of people did so. Definitely not limited to the upper classes.
- hanniabu 7y agoPeople died and were maimed so Crush was fired, but then the company realized people enjoyed it and could still profit off these spectacles so they hired Crush back. One engineer warned that they locamotives would explode and they shunned him as a debbie downer naysayer. Doesn't seem that far off from today where profits trump safety and any reason that stands in the way is ignored.
- ubercow13 7y agoOr you could say, it seems in stark contrast to today's health-and-safety-obsessed corporate culture
- psnosignaluk 7y agoI'd love to see the permit application form that would accompany this kind of thing today.
- jandrese 7y agoRule 1: no live witnesses, cameras and sensors only.
- hanniabu 7y agoIf you think we're safety obsessed, go drink well water next to a fracking well.
- mywittyname 7y agoOr work construction.
- tapland 7y agoI think that a move closer to the late 1800s has been an argument for increased government control that was common 10 or so years ago? But I haven't seen it argued the last few years.
- jopsen 7y ago
- GershwinA 7y agoInteresting story, though I can't say the practice is celebratory. I think there's too much waste in the world, starting from such events where things are like...getting crushed for fun, ending tot he food restaurants throw out. Yet it's an interesting phenomena about the train crashes
- boohoojangles 7y agoI just recently realized that, after moving next to a big park where those big events happens, even the ones self claimed environmental friendly. The next day is so so much garbage of all sorts.
- folli 7y agoWho's to say that this wouldn't also attract crowds today.
- gadders 7y agoI've always wanted to crash two double decker buses head on.
- gggggggg 7y agoI walked inside these buses [0, 1] a few days after the accident, as part of a 'dont speed or drive tired' lesson from a relative police officer who attended the scene of the crash (he was never the same after). All I can say after seeing this is that you would want to do your crash test with remote controls from a distance. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kempsey_bus_crash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kempsey_bus_crash [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=kempsey+bus+accident https://www.google.com/search?q=kempsey+bus+accident
- TorKlingberg 7y agoI think the advent of movie theaters killed it. With today's special effects you can see trains or boats or spaceships crashing into each other in close up for a reasonable price. It's not "real" of course, but probably fills the need.
- wwwhizz 7y agoFunny how there is a 'need' for watching crashes.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoIt grows a need in me to see the real thing - because I know the special FX crashing is invented, and I'd like to know how it would look (and sound, and smell, and feel) in reality.
- PaulAJ 7y agoI remember watching the twin towers collapse on 9/11, and the part of me that wasn't thinking "Oh God!" was thinking "Wow, that looks just like a special effect".
- splitbrain 7y agoI wonder if clean up was part of the costs. I imagine there's quite a few parts that are difficult to move without heavy machinery. Or did they just leave the wreck and tracks as is? If so are there any of those crash sites still visible?
- TheSpiceIsLife 7y agoThe locomotive equivalent of a shipwreck. Train robbers are land pirates.
- michaelt 7y agoThey got the locomotives and tracks to the crash site somehow, so presumably they know a thing or two about moving heavy stuff around.
- splitbrain 7y agoWell, moving a working locomotive is relatively easy compared to a non-working one ;-)
- glouwbug 7y agoA working train without tracks is non-working machinery. They only laid down a mile of tracks for the show
- cr0sh 7y agoIIRC, the way they did it was to hook onto the local rail line; probably just long enough to get the train onto the "spur" - then move the tracks back. Doing that just takes a lot of people and labor (you've probably seen old films of track laying from the late 1800s-early 1900s). They wouldn't install a switch, as that would be too costly for something so temporary; so they probably just broke the track, moved it sideways a bit, connected it to the new "spur", moved the trains/cars onto it, then reconnected it back to the original line to allow traffic thru. Then basically the reverse to move in equipment to dismantle/haul away the remains.
- 7y ago
- inflatableDodo 7y agoThe cultural change in reducing the frequency of this pastime, is that trains today are considered much less cool than they once were, so contemporary America crashes other things into things for fun instead. The current fashion is large navy vessels, apparently.
- liberte82 7y agoOur favorite things to crash are the global economy and the sustainability of the environment
- inflatableDodo 7y agoThey've been crashing into one another for longer than America has existed, to be fair. Though someone did mention, it may have been Germany, that America was last seen laughing hysterically whilst hacking away at the remaining brake lines, so there's that.
- pjc50 7y agoSee also the more serious British Rail / BNFL "flask" crash test: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY446h4pZdc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY446h4pZdc
- TheSpiceIsLife 7y agoHow much power would you estimate that train was producing? If I remember correctly can’t diesel-electric locomotives put out one or two megawatts!
- arethuza 7y agoLooks like an old Deltic - so about 2.4MW max: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_55 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_55 NB The Deltic engines were pretty interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier_Deltic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier_Deltic
- shazeubaa 7y agoImages of Gomez Addams come to mind....
- burfog 7y agoUpdating this for the modern era, I suggest the Airbus 380. Crash a fully fueled pair going full speed at about 800 feet up, with the crowd back 2000 feet.
- peterkelly 7y agoIt's been done with a single 727, though for research purposes rather than entertainment. https://youtu.be/FlX8KsSXg4s?t=2760 https://youtu.be/FlX8KsSXg4s?t=2760
- caf 7y agoImportantly the 727 has ventral stairs to exit!
- heymijo 7y agoGreat work on that timestamp
- grafporno 7y agoThose sound effects were added in post, right?
- LeonM 7y agoI think they got the crash sound from the onboard camera equipment, and the engine sounds from outside cameras. Then mixed it together with tense music for dramatic effect.
- 0xffff2 7y agoNASA did something similar back in the 80's, with somewhat more spectacular results. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVyZeSgxmsw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVyZeSgxmsw
- itronitron 7y agoI guess the pinnacle for an advanced civilization would be crashing black holes into each other.
- kozak 7y agoAm I the only one who routinely watches crash test videos as entertainment?
- degenerate 7y agoI'd watch those if I knew where to look. Can you link a few?
- kozak 7y agohttps://www.euroncap.com/ https://www.euroncap.com/ is the main source, but YouTube searches also occasionally yield some interesting non-European videos (small overlap and other kind of tests that are not routinely conducted by EuroNCAP).
- Theodores 7y agoThis was lowest common denominator entertainment. Today's YouTuber stars make a fine living out of smashing stuff up. They know it is lowest common denominator stuff that will find a ready audience. However, these stunts come to an end, after a while the audience needs something new and not yet another thing smashed up. The thing with the trains is that they were only good for scrap. Being wrecked made little difference to the resale value, bent bits of tin are still of the same weight as finely engineered bits of tin. The current trend of wasting stuff for likes rarely involves stuff that is going to be recycled. How many iphone X's does it take to stop a bullet content results in a lot of waste of new stuff with not a lot recycled. This is in contrast to this train wrecking stunt-meme of a century ago. Although people were killed in the train wrecking stunts people did not go there with that a as premise. Motor racing was about the deadly crashes for most of the last century, if you were a Formula 1 driver then it was a 1 in 3 chance you might not last the season. Spectators went for the chance to see a spectacular crash being part of the entertainment. Public hangings also used to be popular entertainment. So, all considered, pretty good show.
- scandox 7y agoJ.G. Ballard died and went to heaven: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash_(Ballard_novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash_(Ballard_novel)
- setr 7y agoThe crash itself isn’t as important there, as being in the crash — the feel of the crushing steel, on your burning flesh
- atemerev 7y agoCrash testing is important. Making the public aware of what happens in the crash is also important. This is the opportunity to observe many of unknown unknowns, that wouldn't manifest in non-destructive testing. For cars, crash tests are routine, which is good. For planes, unfortunately, there are less common. Now, we need destructive testing for e.g. nuclear reactors (in the controlled and safe environment, of course). We used to do that, but stopped for political reasons.
- eej71 7y agoI believe the Scott Joplin piece The Great Crush Collision March was written to commemorate one mentioned in the article.
- m23khan 7y agoI say time is ripe to bring back this ye olde form of ‘tainment to the masses. Oh, we can have frankfurter rolls and sarsaparilla floats at the fair grounds!
- jsonne 7y agoI know you're joking but that legitimately sounds like a lot of fun.
- adultSwim 7y agoWhere can I find these images from Baylor? I tried their repository, http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu http://digitalcollections.baylor.edu
- dullroar 7y agoI am here to tell you, however, that the spectacle promised by a local county fair of a “combine demo derby” (as in, a demo derby with old combines) did NOT live up to the hype. Crashes there were, but at a lumbering 5MPH (TOPS) they were not “spectacular," especially when some of the combines had to help others get going again with helpful pushes. Let's say my ten-year-old son and I were "underwhelmed." :)
- cr0sh 7y agoI've never seen one, but I wonder if a motorhome/bus derby might be wild...
- Swizec 7y agoYou can see these on Top Gear. They are spectacularly wonderful and I hope I get to experience one in real life some day. To wit they've done everything. Bus derby, RV derby, trailer derby ... it always ends in wonderful amounts of destruction and spectacular crashes.
- ska 7y agoSomething like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohkAxbeMxVo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohkAxbeMxVo
- wahern 7y agoJust saw one this past Sunday at the Alameda County Fair. It was okay. I don't know if it was typical, but there were only two RVs in the arena, presumably because of their large size and poor maneuverability. Also, because the drivers sit atop the engines instead of behind them, and because it wouldn't be cool for any high-slung wreckage to spear another driver through their front or side windows, they avoided frontal contact almost entirely. Oh, and it turns out RVs disintegrate rapidly. I learned that it's not the carnage, per se, but the becoming of carnage that is entertaining. The show was over too quickly. In fact, it ended when one of them caught fire shortly after they lost their radiator. If there were more vehicles then that wouldn't have meant the end of the show. Maybe buses--well built buses--would have been more fun. OTOH, the only demolition derby I'd been to previously was last year's derby at the Alameda County Fair, which was all cars. So probably I should be careful about generalizing. EDIT: The 2017 fair had an RV demolition derby with 5 RVs in the arena: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-Al1TISq_s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-Al1TISq_s
- mc32 7y agoGiven the popularity of kids crashing their toy trains in YouTube videos, this propensity hasn’t abated in people’s minds yet.
- bitwize 7y agoI'm reminded of my nephew who, at four years old, would set up lengths of track on which to crash his toy cars together in what he called "challenges". Strange to think that a railroad executive would turn out to be an overgrown four-year-old crashing real trains together for the fun of it. Especially considering the lives put at risk.
- jessriedel 7y ago> Strange to think that a railroad executive would turn out to be an overgrown four-year-old I'd rather say it's impressive your four-year-old nephew precociously identified great ideas in human entertainment, decades before his time!
- liberte82 7y agoWhen I was a kid my favorite toy was the Crash Test Dummies. They had a whole set of cars, people, motorcycles and other vehicles that would fly apart when thrown against a wall and could be put back together. :)
- cafard 7y agoBack in the early 1960s some such toy as sold. But I recall them as spring-driven--you'd wind them, let them run against a wall and fly apart, then put them back together.
- crazysim 7y agoBeamNG.drive is a modern version of this toy.
- hn_throwaway_99 7y agoCompletely random, but I'm always so impressed by how well-dressed everyone (including the poor) was 100+ years ago. While there are benefits to having less formality in public life I also feel that something important has been lost.
- jandrese 7y agoYeah, but that was their only set of clothes. They look nice because it's what they go to church in as well. Look through old wills and it's shocking to see what people list. Each shirt individually gifted, because they only had 3. Each pair of socks. Their toaster. This wasn't even 100 years ago. We don't realize just how much more buying power we have today. It's a completely different world.
- mywittyname 7y agoMost people had few clothes and what they did have was hand-made. Poor women all knew how to sew, and many were quite good at it. Tailored clothes look really good on people.
- exabrial 7y agoMine was too... HO Scale though
- ChuckMcM 7y agoSo sad to think of those beautiful locomotives destroyed in a spectacle.
- 3minus1 7y agoThis is fascinating. Nowadays people throng to the theaters for the latest Michael Bay special effects extravaganza. It seems like the same impulse, to see a big crash or explosion.
- rjkennedy98 7y agoAmazing how 100 years ago they could lay 1 mile of rail to just to crash old trains. Today it costs millions of dollars to build a mile of track and we still run cars that are 50+ years old.