From time to time, I read or hear about marker stones erected along trackside to commemorate historical events, accidents, or deceased railroaders. The Ames Monument is perhaps a more well-known example of one celebrating a railroading feat and person.
I've also heard about a couple of markers along the Katy commemorating railroaders who had died.
What most recently caught my interest was an Erie route brochure from the 1930s or 40s showing a photo of a marker at Harriman, NY commemorating the world's first telegraphic train orders. Is it still there?
What other hidden gems are out there which readers may know about?

Here's an interesting trackside tombstone in North Praire, Wisconsin:

Boyd

Tombstone Mystery
bowens@rypn.org

There is what appears to be a gravesite on the Santa Fe ROW at Raton Pass, NM. If I remember correctly, it was on the north side of the track and east of the summit. Not sure of its significance, though.

hillmans@cinternet.net

Along the Denver & Rio Grande (now along the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic) there is a memorial to US President Garfield. See link below.

This is along the Toltec gorge near the tunnels.

Brian Norden

Garfield Monument

> From time to time, I read or hear about
> marker stones erected along trackside to
> commemorate historical events, accidents, or
> deceased railroaders.

At mile 10.4 on the WP&YR is Black Cross Rock, located below the tracks. On August 3rd 1898 while blasting for construction of the railroad, two workmen were buried under a granite rock weighing more than 100 tons. Impossible to move, it became their monument. A black cross is erected on the rock to mark their graves.

mike211@yknet.ca

"The Little Boy's Grave" on an abandoned CNW right of way east of Clark, SD is still maintained by a local civic organization. I believe Railfan carried an article about it. Until abandonment, train crews stopped and decorated the grave on Memorial Day. When the line was salvaged the scrappers left a short segment next to the gravesite.

dsrc512@sd.value.net

> From time to time, I read or hear about
> marker stones erected along trackside to
> commemorate historical events, accidents, or
> deceased railroaders. . .
> What other hidden gems are out there which
> readers may know about?

From "www.photo.net":

QUOTE ---------------

"Jim Roybal", "Cecil Reagan". U.S. Hwy. 24, near Camp Hale, Eagle County, Colorado. These crosses lie in a grove of aspen off to the side of U.S. Hwy. 24 as it makes its southbound climb up out of Camp Hale, on the long approach to Tennessee Pass, north of Leadville. Motorists catching a glimpse of them might assume that they mark an automobile accident, but they have a different story behind them than most roadside crosses. Jim Roybal was the engineer, and Cecil Reagan was a student engineer in his cab, when their freight train ran out of control while coming down the north side of Tennessee Pass in a blizzard one night in February, 1996. Getting a freight train down a mountain pass is risky even in the best of conditions; if the brakes are not applied properly, the momentum of the train can build to the point that the brakes become useless, and the train simply keeps gathering speed until it is unable to hold the rails. The train Jim and Cecil were operating was over a mile long; these crosses are near the place where the engine left the tracks, not far from the highway, up the slope through the trees. The crosses bear the markings "51 Jim Roybal 96", "62 Cecil Reagan 96", the numbers in each case being dates of birth and death.

END QUOTE -----------

The link takes you to a page to a photographer who has created a photographic essay of roadside memorials. Jim Roybal and Cecil Regan's is about a third of the way down the page.

Ed

http://www.photo.net/photodb/presentation?presentation_id=97863

This piqued my curiosity--found a Web site with images an more detials. Very touching story. Sad that railroads no longer have this kind of human contact with the community so much as they once did.

Little Fellow Service
eledbetter@rypn.org

The early B&O must have been VERY pleased with itself for completing the Thomas Viaduct at Relay, MD--not only did they name it after director Phillip E. Thomas, they erected a small obelisk at the North end to memorialize the designers and contractors (not, mind you, the laboring men--this was just the money men and the bosses).

For a few decades there was a stranger monument still hidden in the weeds a few feet away. For a century the fabulous E.F. Baldwin-designed Relay House station-hotel stood in the Y junction at the North end of the viaduct. The B&O finally screwed up its courage and knocked the disused structure down in the 1950s. To placate the ghosts, they erected a small stone memorial with a brass plaque--a monument for the deceased building! I haven't looked for it in a few years, but I beleive it is eaither badly overgrown, or more likely vandalized into oblivion.

eledbetter@rypn.org

There's a marker and a dig going on down near Malvern, PA, in Duffy's Cut. The legend has it that a number of Irish laborers died of cholera while working on the Main Line. A memorial has been there for years, but now some local, archeological types are digging around with trowels to see if they can find any Hibernian remains.

Steve

> From time to time, I read or hear about
> marker stones erected along trackside to
> commemorate historical events, accidents, or
> deceased railroaders. The Ames Monument is
> perhaps a more well-known example of one
> celebrating a railroading feat and person.
> I've also heard about a couple of markers
> along the Katy commemorating railroaders who
> had died.
> What most recently caught my interest was an
> Erie route brochure from the 1930s or 40s
> showing a photo of a marker at Harriman, NY
> commemorating the world's first telegraphic
> train orders. Is it still there?
> What other hidden gems are out there which
> readers may know about?


Strasburg Rail Road
ssweaver@paonline.com

In 1922, the Rock Island planted a bunch of memorial trees to fallen workers at numerous on-line towns, with a nearby plaque and monument. More info below.

http://www.simpson.edu/~RITS/histories/trees/trees.html
ryarger@rypn.org

A marker stands next to the CSXT tracks (former Western & Atlantic) a mile or so north of the depot at Ringgold, GA, marking the site where "The General" ran out of wood and water and its crew of Northern saboteurs were captured at the end of the Great Locomotive Chase in 1862.

K4s1361@hotmail.com

>In Little Falls, NY there is a marker in memory of the 31 who died in the 1940 New York Central wreck of the Lake Shore Limited. It is very close to the site of the accident, but due to rerouting of track and roadways, not the exact spot.

fitzrr@pioneer.net

At Allatoona Pass on the Western and Atlantic Railroad of the State of Georgia, there is at least one trackside grave. It is the grave of a confederate solider, belived to have been killed in the Battle of Allatoona Pass as Johnson slowly retreated towards Atlanta. Many years ago, a fence was erected by the Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway to protect the grave and a cast iron sign erected, reading "An Unknown Hero." Reportedly there have been archeological excavations at that site which indicate that additional graves are present near the right of way at Allatoona Pass, likely other wartime graves. Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum paid a similar tribute to one of it's longtime members, Louis Hunziker (one of our engineers). Upon his passing, his cremains were scattered along the right of way at Milepost 1. A few months later, a cast iron sign reading "Hunziker Curve" was placed at Milepost 1.1.

Then, there is the National Cemetary at Chattanooga, Tennessee. One entire side of the burial ground fronts along the right of way of the Western and Atlantic Railroad of the State of Georgia and Norfolk Southern Railway yard. On the opposite side, the cemetary is boardered by Holtzclaw Avenue and the East Chattanooga Belt Railway. This is the cemetary in which some of the Andrew's Raiders are interred and the only cemetary containing the grave of more than one Raider. They are buried around the Ohio Monument, dedicated in 1891.

National Association of Watch and Clock Collectors
awalker1829@yahoo.com

While not erected by the railroads there are sometimes graveyards along the tracks that are nearly forgotten about.

There is a small out of the way cemetery along the old B&O (CSX) in the area called Magnolia Cut-Off at a place called Keselers. The cemetery is a very old one and sadly many of the persons buried there were very young when they died.

There is also a samll cemetery right next to the Western Maryland right of way at Salisbury Viaduct. I am sure there are others as well.

Tom Gears