I was unable to make the post yesterday but here goes a day late. November 7 is known as "Dia del Ferrocarrilero" or Day of the Railway Worker. On November 7, 1907 railway machinist Jesus Garcia Corona saved the town of Nacozari, Mexico by hustling a train loaded with dynamite that caught fire away from town. The train exploded away from the town killing Corona but he saved many lives. The story is linked below.

https://www.cndh.org.mx/noticia/dia-del ... defensa-de

With appropriate apologies, I didn't post this reminder on November 7th because I was snowed in for the last few days with no computer access. Here's the thread from last year:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=47010&hilit=Dia+del+Ferrocarrilero

The article linked from Tommy's announcement contains a critical error: Jesus Garcia was working as a locomotive engineer when the incident occurred. A tip off that something is wrong with their version is that he is identified as a "Machinista". There is no such word in Spanish --- the word for machinist is "mecanico", although a machinist is usually identified by his area of specialty, for instance a "tornero" is a lathe operator (lathe = "torno" in Spanish). A locomotive engineer is called a "Maquinista" in Spanish.

At any rate, I admit it's unlikely that we will ever have a recognized holiday honoring railroaders in this country, but once again I offer the suggestion that at least railroaders should observe this holiday every year on November 7th. If we won't remember and honor our own heros, it's a cinch that nobody else will....

I have never been a "rail", following different callings, but I won't let this thread disappear into the ether with only Tom and Sammy.

Sammy said,[quote= If we won't remember and honor our own heros, it's a cinch that nobody else will....[/quote]

It is because of your postings, gentlemen, that I also, a non-railroader, honor this man and this day. I learned of him and it from you here.

Wise men taught me that courage is contagious; that if you want it the best place to learn is from those who found it. I have been privileged to know heroes; a man in the bowels of the U.S. Pennsylvania that fateful day in Pearl Harbor in 1941 who would go on to have three more ships sunk under him, one of the "band of brothers" in Patton's army who landed in North Africa and Sicily and Normandy and fought across Europe, a navigator in patrol bombers in the Pacific with whom I was privileged to spend the last hours of his life while he told me all the times he almost died and how.

And there have been others in events not so famous, dealt a losing hand in the game of life (and all of ours are losing in the end) who yet found a way to confront the Enemy with dignity and compassion and kindness and make a difference.

To the last one none of them thought themselves "heroes" (they identified others who were to them) and on the day each rose above in heroism they were not seeking to do more than just what they considered their "job". They acted because it was already in them.

So with you I seek to honor and remember courage wherever I find it and pass it on to those following. In so doing we enlarge ourselves, and whenever we think there are not many with us in it, I suspect we will always be wrong. Heroism and courage have a way of finding their own.

A blessed if belated "Dia del Ferrocarrilero" to you both, and all your kin,

Timothy

Thanks for your post, Timothy, I couldn't have said it any better.

Que descanse en paz. Everyone should know about him.

I wonder if there will be a successor to Freeman Hubbard's 'Great Stories of Railroading', which was one of my very favorite books when it was published in the early '60s. This story should be in it.

IIRC, the first time I heard of Jesus Garcia de Corona was in a RR story anthology that I had when I was a youngster --- A Treasury of American Railroad Folklore, by Botkin & Harlow. You notice that a Mexican railroader was included, in recognition of the fact that Mexico is part of North America. It "might have been" in a different book, as always, corrections welcome.