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On April 30, 1900, Casey Jones died heroically in a train wreck at Vaughn, Mississippi, while driving Cannonball Express (immortalized in the "Ballad of Casey Jones"). From the article:
"Casey Jones
Early Life
Famed American folk hero Casey Jones was born John Luther Jones on March 14, 1864, in a rural part of southeastern Missouri. When Jones was a young boy, his father, Frank Jones, a school teacher, and his mother, Ann Nolan Jones, determined that the backwoods of Missouri offered little opportunity for their family, and, subsequently, the Jones family moved to Cacey, Kentucky—a town that was the source of Jones's nickname: "Casey."
While growing up in Cacey, Jones became extremely interested in the railroad and aspired to become an engineer. The American railroad passenger system was a relatively new and exciting mode of transportation, as people were able to travel great distances at high speeds.
Railroad Worker
At the age of 15, Casey Jones moved to Columbus, Kentucky, and began working as a telegrapher for the Mobile and Ohio railroad. In 1884, he moved to Jackson, Tennessee, where he was promoted at M&O to the position of flagman. While living in a boarding house in Jackson, Jones met and fell in love with Joanne "Janie" Brady, the daughter of a proprietor. The couple wed on November 26, 1886, and moved into a place of their own in Jackson. They would have two sons and a daughter together.
Jones was successful at M&O, quickly moving up the ranks. In 1891, he was offered a job at Illinois Central Railroad as an engineer. Jones earned a reputation as an engineer who would always stay on schedule, even if it meant pushing the train to great and sometimes dangerous speeds—a trait that made him a popular employee. The public began to recognize Jones for the "whippoorwill call" he would make on the engine's whistle while driving through towns.
Death
On April 30, 1900, Jones volunteered to work a double shift to cover for a fellow engineer who was ill. He had just completed a run from Canton, Mississippi, to Memphis, Tennessee, and was now faced with the task of returning on board Engine No. 1 headed southbound. Sam Webb, a fireman for Illinois Central, accompanied Jones on the journey. The train was originally running more than an hour and a half behind, and Jones, determined to arrive as scheduled, ran the steam locomotive at speeds nearing 100 miles per hour in an effort to make up the time.
As Jones took a turn into Vaughan, Mississippi, Webb warned him that there was another train parked on the tracks ahead of them. As quickly as he could, Jones grabbed the brake with one hand and pulled the whistle with the other in an attempt to warn those around the train. Jones then turned to Webb and told him to jump to safety, all the while still trying to slow the train. The collision was brutal. All passengers on the train survived, with the exception of Casey Jones, who was struck in the throat while still holding one hand on the break and one hand on the whistle.
Legend
Shortly after Casey Jones's death, Wallace Saunders, an engine wiper who worked for I.E., wrote "The Ballad of Casey Jones," a tribute to Jones, who Saunders greatly admired. The song was later adapted by William Leighton and sold to vaudeville artists. The ballad became extremely popular and made Casey Jones an American legend. To this day, Jones's name is synonymous with the America's great steam era."
"Casey Jones
Early Life
Famed American folk hero Casey Jones was born John Luther Jones on March 14, 1864, in a rural part of southeastern Missouri. When Jones was a young boy, his father, Frank Jones, a school teacher, and his mother, Ann Nolan Jones, determined that the backwoods of Missouri offered little opportunity for their family, and, subsequently, the Jones family moved to Cacey, Kentucky—a town that was the source of Jones's nickname: "Casey."
While growing up in Cacey, Jones became extremely interested in the railroad and aspired to become an engineer. The American railroad passenger system was a relatively new and exciting mode of transportation, as people were able to travel great distances at high speeds.
Railroad Worker
At the age of 15, Casey Jones moved to Columbus, Kentucky, and began working as a telegrapher for the Mobile and Ohio railroad. In 1884, he moved to Jackson, Tennessee, where he was promoted at M&O to the position of flagman. While living in a boarding house in Jackson, Jones met and fell in love with Joanne "Janie" Brady, the daughter of a proprietor. The couple wed on November 26, 1886, and moved into a place of their own in Jackson. They would have two sons and a daughter together.
Jones was successful at M&O, quickly moving up the ranks. In 1891, he was offered a job at Illinois Central Railroad as an engineer. Jones earned a reputation as an engineer who would always stay on schedule, even if it meant pushing the train to great and sometimes dangerous speeds—a trait that made him a popular employee. The public began to recognize Jones for the "whippoorwill call" he would make on the engine's whistle while driving through towns.
Death
On April 30, 1900, Jones volunteered to work a double shift to cover for a fellow engineer who was ill. He had just completed a run from Canton, Mississippi, to Memphis, Tennessee, and was now faced with the task of returning on board Engine No. 1 headed southbound. Sam Webb, a fireman for Illinois Central, accompanied Jones on the journey. The train was originally running more than an hour and a half behind, and Jones, determined to arrive as scheduled, ran the steam locomotive at speeds nearing 100 miles per hour in an effort to make up the time.
As Jones took a turn into Vaughan, Mississippi, Webb warned him that there was another train parked on the tracks ahead of them. As quickly as he could, Jones grabbed the brake with one hand and pulled the whistle with the other in an attempt to warn those around the train. Jones then turned to Webb and told him to jump to safety, all the while still trying to slow the train. The collision was brutal. All passengers on the train survived, with the exception of Casey Jones, who was struck in the throat while still holding one hand on the break and one hand on the whistle.
Legend
Shortly after Casey Jones's death, Wallace Saunders, an engine wiper who worked for I.E., wrote "The Ballad of Casey Jones," a tribute to Jones, who Saunders greatly admired. The song was later adapted by William Leighton and sold to vaudeville artists. The ballad became extremely popular and made Casey Jones an American legend. To this day, Jones's name is synonymous with the America's great steam era."
Casey Jones
Posted from biography.com
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Thank you my friend Maj Marty Hogan for making us aware that March 14 is the anniversary of the birth of American railroader who worked for the Illinois Central Railroad (IC) Jonathan Luther "Casey" Jones was killed on April 30, 1900, when his train collided with a stalled freight train near Vaughan, Mississippi.
Rest in Peace Casey Jones!
Images:
1. Jonathan Luther 'Casey' Jones
2. On April 30, 1900, Jonathan Luther 'Casey' Jones alone was killed when his passenger train, the Cannonball Express, collided with a stalled freight train at Vaughan, Mississippi, on a foggy and rainy night.
3. 1950 U.S. #993 commemorates the role of railroad engineers in building America. The stamp pictures folk hero John Luther 'Casey' Jones, who was killed in a train wreck near Vaughn, Mississippi
4. Casey Jones plague
Casey Jones: Mini Documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvfCGlXRYAA
Biographies:
1. tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/jonathan-luther-jones/]
2. gypsyjournalrv.com/2018/10/casey-jones-railroad-hero/
1. Background from [https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/jonathan-luther-jones/]
"In an era when spectacular train wrecks were common, the fate of Illinois Central engineer Jonathan Luther Jones should not have aroused popular interest. Yet “Casey Jones, the Brave Engineer” has become one of Tennessee’s great folk heroes and a prominent character in American railroad lore. The legend of Casey Jones owes its creation to a black engine wiper at the Illinois Central Roundhouse in Canton, Mississippi. Wallace Saunders composed the verses about his engineer friend that embellished the events of April 30, 1900, and made Casey Jones a legend.
Jones was born on March 14, 1863. His schoolteacher father moved the family to Cayce, Kentucky, when Jones was in his teens. There he watched the locomotives at the Mobile and Ohio Railroad yards and decided to make railroading his career. In 1878, at the age of fifteen, Jones left his family to work on the Mobile and Ohio. The road transferred him to Jackson, Tennessee, where he met and married Janie Brady in 1886. Jones established a reputation for staying on schedule while running the freight route between Jackson and Water Valley, Mississippi. He always announced his approach with a blast of the calliope whistle, which sounded like a whippoorwill in the night.
In January 1900 Jones was transferred to a passenger run between Memphis and Canton, Mississippi, which made up one leg of a four-train run linking Chicago and New Orleans. The “Cannonball Express” had a reputation for speed, and so did Jones. He completed his day’s work on the morning of April 29 and pulled train Number 1 into Memphis’s Poplar Street Station. The regular engineer for the Canton run was ill, and Jones agreed to double up. He asked that his favorite engine, Number 382, be readied for the return trip. The train was ninety-five minutes behind schedule when it left the station, but Jones and fireman Sim Webb were determined to make up the time over the 188-mile run. Nearing Vaughn, Mississippi, Jones was only two minutes behind schedule and within 15 miles of his destination. Up ahead, however, a freight train with a mechanical failure was unable to move off the main line onto a siding. When Jones saw the lights of the caboose, he yelled for Webb to jump. Jones stayed on the train to apply the brakes, thereby saving the lives of his passengers. The fireman escaped with minor injuries. No one but Jones died in the wreck when the engine slammed into the freight train’s caboose. The Illinois Central claimed to have issued warnings regarding the stalled trains, but Webb contended they saw no signals.
Wallace Saunders’s version of the story spread through the vaudeville circuit, and in 1909 Lawrence Seibert and Eddie Newton altered the lyrics and copyrighted a version of “Casey Jones, the Brave Engineer.” Their version popularized the song and became the basis for over two hundred later versions by everyone from the Boy Scouts to the Grateful Dead. Jones has been immortalized by a postage stamp, books, and the Casey Jones Home and Railroad Museum in Jackson. Although the songs often misrepresent the facts, they made the courage and heroism of the railroad man an American legend."
2. Background from [https://gypsyjournalrv.com/2018/10/casey-jones-railroad-hero/]
"Casey Jones, Railroad Hero
Posted by Nick Russell at 12:43 am Nick's Blog
He was a simple man, a hardworking husband and father who loved his family, took great pride in his job, and died doing what he knew best. Yet Casey Jones became an American folk hero the likes of Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, and Johnny Appleseed; along with mythical heroes like Paul Bunyan and Pecos Bill.
T. Clark Shaw, Chief Executive Officer for Brooks Shaw’s Old Country Store, part of the Casey Jones Village in Jackson, Tennessee, said it best when he wrote “The life and legend of Casey Jones and how it all came about is most fascinating and one in which we should all be proud, for it is not only the story of one man’s death, but his dedication to duty that is representative of a people and nation whose adventurous spirit helped mold the America we know today.”
Jonathan Luther Jones was born on March 14, 1863 in the boot heel of Missouri, the son of a country school teacher named Frank Jones and his wife Anne. When Jonathan was a young boy, the family moved to the small town of Cayce, Kentucky.
This was the great age of the steam locomotive, and like most boys of his age and time, young Jonathan was enamored with the massive, powerful machines. His favorite pastime was hanging around the Cayce train depot, and dreaming of the exciting places the trains traveled to. At the age of 15, he got hired as a telegraph operator with the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. The industrious young man caught the eye of his superiors and soon worked his way up to become a brakeman and fireman.
The railroad transferred Jonathan to Jackson, Tennessee, and the busy little city would become his home. He rented a room in a boarding house that catered to railroad men. It was here that he got his nickname, when a fellow boarder asked him where he was from. He replied, “Cayce, Kentucky,” and was known ever after as Casey Jones. Before long, Casey met and fell in love with his landlady’s daughter, a pretty young girl named Janie Brady. They were married in St. Mary’s Catholic Church on November 25, 1886. The couple would eventually have three children, two boys and a girl.
During this time, Casey Jones became employed with the Illinois Central Railroad and was promoted to the cherished position of engineer, and ran freight trains between Jackson and Water Valley, Mississippi.
By 1900, Casey Jones was an experienced and trusted engineer, though he was occasionally disciplined for pushing the railroad’s established speed limits. He was dedicated to “getting there on the advertised,” which meant arriving at the station on schedule. If that meant having the fireman shovel on a little more coal and running faster than the boys back in the office wanted him to, so be it.
In January, 1900, Casey was transferred to Memphis to handle part of the passenger run between Chicago and New Orleans. Casey’s assigned portion of the route would be from Memphis to Canton, Mississippi.
Casey was not supposed to be at the throttle of the train that fateful day of April 30, 1900. He and Sim Webb, his regular fireman, pulled into Memphis on the morning of April 29th from Canton, turned their train over to the next crew, and were scheduled to lay over until the next day before making the run back to Canton.
But Sam Tate, another engineer, had fallen ill and the stationmaster needed to find a replacement. Always ready to go the extra mile for the company, Casey stepped in to fill the vacancy. By the time the Number 1 train from Chicago arrived, later then expected, Casey and Webb were already 90 minutes behind schedule when they crawled into the cab of their locomotive.
Casey’s engine Number 382 sounded its distinctive six tone calliope whistle as they pulled out of the station at 12:30 a.m. It is 187 miles from Memphis to Canton as the crow flies, and Casey was determined to make up for the lost time and get into Canton on schedule. Sim Webb shoveled coal furiously and Casey poured on steam as they raced through the night. They sped past Grenada and Winona, Mississippi, and by the time they reached Vaughn, Mississippi, they were just two minutes behind. But fate had a terrible roadblock waiting on the rails ahead.
There were three other trains already in Vaughn. One had moved off the main line, and the other two were jockeying into position onto a side track. Due to a mechanical failure, four cars of one of the other trains remained on the main tracks when Casey Jones roared out of the night, just before 4 a.m.
As they came out of an S turn, Sim Webb spotted the red lights of the caboose on the main line and shouted out a warning. Casey responded immediately, throwing the locomotive’s throttle in reverse, jamming on the brakes, and blasting a warning on his horn.
Casey ordered Webb to jump and the fireman did at the last minute, sparing his life. Casey could have jumped, too, but he bravely stayed in the locomotive’s cab, doing everything he could to slow the train before impact.
The locomotive slammed into the train ahead, ripping its way through the wooden caboose, a car loaded with hay, another car loaded with corn, and partway through a car loaded with timber before it jumped the track. Casey Jones, the hard driving engineer, was found dead in the wreckage. He was 37 years old.
Nobody else was seriously injured in the train wreck, and credit for that goes to Casey. He could have jumped to safety, but chose instead to stay and try to slow the train as much as possible before the crash, reducing the risk to his passengers.
The official blame for the accident was laid at Casey’s feet. The railroad said he had disregarded signals that the tracks ahead were blocked. But until his own death, in 1957, Casey’s fireman, Sim Webb, insisted that there was no flagman or flare warning them of the danger that lay ahead.
Casey Jones was brought home to Jackson, Tennessee, where he was buried in the Mount Calvary Cemetery. But though the man was gone, a legend had been born. A worker at the Canton roundhouse, who spent his time singing as he wiped down the locomotives, made up a song about the popular engineer who was mourned by all who knew him. That song, the Ballad of Casey Jones, became popular nationwide. Three decades after his death, the story of Casey Jones was still told around potbellied stoves in railroad depots and living rooms across the nation. A book, movie, television, and radio series all added to Casey’s posthumous fame.
In 1956, the home where Casey and his wife lived at the time of his death was made into a museum, filled with railroad artifacts and memorabilia of the engineer’s life.
Today the home has been relocated, carefully restored, and is the Casey Jones Home Railroad Museum, the centerpiece of the Casey Jones Village complex, which includes the home, a display of railroad cars, ships, and Brooks Shaw’s Old Country Store restaurant. Visitors can watch a video about Casey Jones, tour his home, shop for railroad souvenirs in the gift shop, and enjoy a delicious old fashioned meal in the restaurant.Mount Calvary Cemetery, on Hardee Street in East Jackson, where Casey is buried, is only open on Sundays. The cemetery is administered by Saint Mary’s Catholic Church, and they have been known to loan someone a key to the cemetery gate to gain access. If you do visit the cemetery to pay your respects, you may notice that the headstone says Casey Jones was born in 1864. This is an error. According to information written in the Jones family Bible, he was born in 1863. The tombstone was donated by two railroad enthusiasts, who accidentally got the wrong birth year.
A stop at Casey Jones Village, located just off Interstate 40 at Exit 80, gives visitors an opportunity to learn more about the brave engineer who drove his train into legend on that foggy night in Mississippi. The home is open Monday – Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Sunday from 1 – 5 p.m. Admission is $6.50 for adults, $5.50 for seniors, $4.50 for children ages 6 to 12, and children 5 and under are admitted free. "
FYI SSG Robert Mark OdomSP5 Jesse EngelSPC Matthew Lamb
SSG Robert "Rob" WentworthCapt Rich BuckleyCW4 G.L. Smith
SPC Russ BoltonSPC Gordon RiceSFC Terry WilcoxPO2 Roger LafarletteSPC Nancy GreeneSSG Franklin Briant1stsgt Glenn BrackinJennifer Lee (Doerflinger) Hill SFC Greg Bruorton
SP6 Stephen RogersonSSgt Corwin WhickerCPT Paul Whitmer
1SG Steven Imerman
Rest in Peace Casey Jones!
Images:
1. Jonathan Luther 'Casey' Jones
2. On April 30, 1900, Jonathan Luther 'Casey' Jones alone was killed when his passenger train, the Cannonball Express, collided with a stalled freight train at Vaughan, Mississippi, on a foggy and rainy night.
3. 1950 U.S. #993 commemorates the role of railroad engineers in building America. The stamp pictures folk hero John Luther 'Casey' Jones, who was killed in a train wreck near Vaughn, Mississippi
4. Casey Jones plague
Casey Jones: Mini Documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvfCGlXRYAA
Biographies:
1. tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/jonathan-luther-jones/]
2. gypsyjournalrv.com/2018/10/casey-jones-railroad-hero/
1. Background from [https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/jonathan-luther-jones/]
"In an era when spectacular train wrecks were common, the fate of Illinois Central engineer Jonathan Luther Jones should not have aroused popular interest. Yet “Casey Jones, the Brave Engineer” has become one of Tennessee’s great folk heroes and a prominent character in American railroad lore. The legend of Casey Jones owes its creation to a black engine wiper at the Illinois Central Roundhouse in Canton, Mississippi. Wallace Saunders composed the verses about his engineer friend that embellished the events of April 30, 1900, and made Casey Jones a legend.
Jones was born on March 14, 1863. His schoolteacher father moved the family to Cayce, Kentucky, when Jones was in his teens. There he watched the locomotives at the Mobile and Ohio Railroad yards and decided to make railroading his career. In 1878, at the age of fifteen, Jones left his family to work on the Mobile and Ohio. The road transferred him to Jackson, Tennessee, where he met and married Janie Brady in 1886. Jones established a reputation for staying on schedule while running the freight route between Jackson and Water Valley, Mississippi. He always announced his approach with a blast of the calliope whistle, which sounded like a whippoorwill in the night.
In January 1900 Jones was transferred to a passenger run between Memphis and Canton, Mississippi, which made up one leg of a four-train run linking Chicago and New Orleans. The “Cannonball Express” had a reputation for speed, and so did Jones. He completed his day’s work on the morning of April 29 and pulled train Number 1 into Memphis’s Poplar Street Station. The regular engineer for the Canton run was ill, and Jones agreed to double up. He asked that his favorite engine, Number 382, be readied for the return trip. The train was ninety-five minutes behind schedule when it left the station, but Jones and fireman Sim Webb were determined to make up the time over the 188-mile run. Nearing Vaughn, Mississippi, Jones was only two minutes behind schedule and within 15 miles of his destination. Up ahead, however, a freight train with a mechanical failure was unable to move off the main line onto a siding. When Jones saw the lights of the caboose, he yelled for Webb to jump. Jones stayed on the train to apply the brakes, thereby saving the lives of his passengers. The fireman escaped with minor injuries. No one but Jones died in the wreck when the engine slammed into the freight train’s caboose. The Illinois Central claimed to have issued warnings regarding the stalled trains, but Webb contended they saw no signals.
Wallace Saunders’s version of the story spread through the vaudeville circuit, and in 1909 Lawrence Seibert and Eddie Newton altered the lyrics and copyrighted a version of “Casey Jones, the Brave Engineer.” Their version popularized the song and became the basis for over two hundred later versions by everyone from the Boy Scouts to the Grateful Dead. Jones has been immortalized by a postage stamp, books, and the Casey Jones Home and Railroad Museum in Jackson. Although the songs often misrepresent the facts, they made the courage and heroism of the railroad man an American legend."
2. Background from [https://gypsyjournalrv.com/2018/10/casey-jones-railroad-hero/]
"Casey Jones, Railroad Hero
Posted by Nick Russell at 12:43 am Nick's Blog
He was a simple man, a hardworking husband and father who loved his family, took great pride in his job, and died doing what he knew best. Yet Casey Jones became an American folk hero the likes of Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, and Johnny Appleseed; along with mythical heroes like Paul Bunyan and Pecos Bill.
T. Clark Shaw, Chief Executive Officer for Brooks Shaw’s Old Country Store, part of the Casey Jones Village in Jackson, Tennessee, said it best when he wrote “The life and legend of Casey Jones and how it all came about is most fascinating and one in which we should all be proud, for it is not only the story of one man’s death, but his dedication to duty that is representative of a people and nation whose adventurous spirit helped mold the America we know today.”
Jonathan Luther Jones was born on March 14, 1863 in the boot heel of Missouri, the son of a country school teacher named Frank Jones and his wife Anne. When Jonathan was a young boy, the family moved to the small town of Cayce, Kentucky.
This was the great age of the steam locomotive, and like most boys of his age and time, young Jonathan was enamored with the massive, powerful machines. His favorite pastime was hanging around the Cayce train depot, and dreaming of the exciting places the trains traveled to. At the age of 15, he got hired as a telegraph operator with the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. The industrious young man caught the eye of his superiors and soon worked his way up to become a brakeman and fireman.
The railroad transferred Jonathan to Jackson, Tennessee, and the busy little city would become his home. He rented a room in a boarding house that catered to railroad men. It was here that he got his nickname, when a fellow boarder asked him where he was from. He replied, “Cayce, Kentucky,” and was known ever after as Casey Jones. Before long, Casey met and fell in love with his landlady’s daughter, a pretty young girl named Janie Brady. They were married in St. Mary’s Catholic Church on November 25, 1886. The couple would eventually have three children, two boys and a girl.
During this time, Casey Jones became employed with the Illinois Central Railroad and was promoted to the cherished position of engineer, and ran freight trains between Jackson and Water Valley, Mississippi.
By 1900, Casey Jones was an experienced and trusted engineer, though he was occasionally disciplined for pushing the railroad’s established speed limits. He was dedicated to “getting there on the advertised,” which meant arriving at the station on schedule. If that meant having the fireman shovel on a little more coal and running faster than the boys back in the office wanted him to, so be it.
In January, 1900, Casey was transferred to Memphis to handle part of the passenger run between Chicago and New Orleans. Casey’s assigned portion of the route would be from Memphis to Canton, Mississippi.
Casey was not supposed to be at the throttle of the train that fateful day of April 30, 1900. He and Sim Webb, his regular fireman, pulled into Memphis on the morning of April 29th from Canton, turned their train over to the next crew, and were scheduled to lay over until the next day before making the run back to Canton.
But Sam Tate, another engineer, had fallen ill and the stationmaster needed to find a replacement. Always ready to go the extra mile for the company, Casey stepped in to fill the vacancy. By the time the Number 1 train from Chicago arrived, later then expected, Casey and Webb were already 90 minutes behind schedule when they crawled into the cab of their locomotive.
Casey’s engine Number 382 sounded its distinctive six tone calliope whistle as they pulled out of the station at 12:30 a.m. It is 187 miles from Memphis to Canton as the crow flies, and Casey was determined to make up for the lost time and get into Canton on schedule. Sim Webb shoveled coal furiously and Casey poured on steam as they raced through the night. They sped past Grenada and Winona, Mississippi, and by the time they reached Vaughn, Mississippi, they were just two minutes behind. But fate had a terrible roadblock waiting on the rails ahead.
There were three other trains already in Vaughn. One had moved off the main line, and the other two were jockeying into position onto a side track. Due to a mechanical failure, four cars of one of the other trains remained on the main tracks when Casey Jones roared out of the night, just before 4 a.m.
As they came out of an S turn, Sim Webb spotted the red lights of the caboose on the main line and shouted out a warning. Casey responded immediately, throwing the locomotive’s throttle in reverse, jamming on the brakes, and blasting a warning on his horn.
Casey ordered Webb to jump and the fireman did at the last minute, sparing his life. Casey could have jumped, too, but he bravely stayed in the locomotive’s cab, doing everything he could to slow the train before impact.
The locomotive slammed into the train ahead, ripping its way through the wooden caboose, a car loaded with hay, another car loaded with corn, and partway through a car loaded with timber before it jumped the track. Casey Jones, the hard driving engineer, was found dead in the wreckage. He was 37 years old.
Nobody else was seriously injured in the train wreck, and credit for that goes to Casey. He could have jumped to safety, but chose instead to stay and try to slow the train as much as possible before the crash, reducing the risk to his passengers.
The official blame for the accident was laid at Casey’s feet. The railroad said he had disregarded signals that the tracks ahead were blocked. But until his own death, in 1957, Casey’s fireman, Sim Webb, insisted that there was no flagman or flare warning them of the danger that lay ahead.
Casey Jones was brought home to Jackson, Tennessee, where he was buried in the Mount Calvary Cemetery. But though the man was gone, a legend had been born. A worker at the Canton roundhouse, who spent his time singing as he wiped down the locomotives, made up a song about the popular engineer who was mourned by all who knew him. That song, the Ballad of Casey Jones, became popular nationwide. Three decades after his death, the story of Casey Jones was still told around potbellied stoves in railroad depots and living rooms across the nation. A book, movie, television, and radio series all added to Casey’s posthumous fame.
In 1956, the home where Casey and his wife lived at the time of his death was made into a museum, filled with railroad artifacts and memorabilia of the engineer’s life.
Today the home has been relocated, carefully restored, and is the Casey Jones Home Railroad Museum, the centerpiece of the Casey Jones Village complex, which includes the home, a display of railroad cars, ships, and Brooks Shaw’s Old Country Store restaurant. Visitors can watch a video about Casey Jones, tour his home, shop for railroad souvenirs in the gift shop, and enjoy a delicious old fashioned meal in the restaurant.Mount Calvary Cemetery, on Hardee Street in East Jackson, where Casey is buried, is only open on Sundays. The cemetery is administered by Saint Mary’s Catholic Church, and they have been known to loan someone a key to the cemetery gate to gain access. If you do visit the cemetery to pay your respects, you may notice that the headstone says Casey Jones was born in 1864. This is an error. According to information written in the Jones family Bible, he was born in 1863. The tombstone was donated by two railroad enthusiasts, who accidentally got the wrong birth year.
A stop at Casey Jones Village, located just off Interstate 40 at Exit 80, gives visitors an opportunity to learn more about the brave engineer who drove his train into legend on that foggy night in Mississippi. The home is open Monday – Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Sunday from 1 – 5 p.m. Admission is $6.50 for adults, $5.50 for seniors, $4.50 for children ages 6 to 12, and children 5 and under are admitted free. "
FYI SSG Robert Mark OdomSP5 Jesse EngelSPC Matthew Lamb
SSG Robert "Rob" WentworthCapt Rich BuckleyCW4 G.L. Smith
SPC Russ BoltonSPC Gordon RiceSFC Terry WilcoxPO2 Roger LafarletteSPC Nancy GreeneSSG Franklin Briant1stsgt Glenn BrackinJennifer Lee (Doerflinger) Hill SFC Greg Bruorton
SP6 Stephen RogersonSSgt Corwin WhickerCPT Paul Whitmer
1SG Steven Imerman
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(0)
LTC Stephen F.
(The Ballad of ) Casey Jones (Lyrics) - (Seibert-Newton) Arr.P.M.Adamson
This is a classic song based on a true story about Engine Driver Casey Jones who was led to an untimely death as a result of his desire to get there on time....
(The Ballad of ) Casey Jones (Lyrics) - (Seibert-Newton) Arr.P.M.Adamson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJKCWaiYUP4
Images:
1. Casey Jones home & Railroad Museum at 30 Casey Jones Ln, Jackson, TN 38305
2. John Luther 'Casey' Jones headstone
FYI SSG Samuel KermonSP5 Geoffrey VannersonCol Casey "Radio" G.SFC John LichSgt Jackie JuliusSFC Richard WilliamsonSPC Randy ZimmermanSP5 Dave (Shotgun) Shockley SPC Margaret Higgins SCPO Morris Ramsey MSG Brad Sand SGM Steve WettsteinLTC Bill Koski SPC (Join to see)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJKCWaiYUP4
Images:
1. Casey Jones home & Railroad Museum at 30 Casey Jones Ln, Jackson, TN 38305
2. John Luther 'Casey' Jones headstone
FYI SSG Samuel KermonSP5 Geoffrey VannersonCol Casey "Radio" G.SFC John LichSgt Jackie JuliusSFC Richard WilliamsonSPC Randy ZimmermanSP5 Dave (Shotgun) Shockley SPC Margaret Higgins SCPO Morris Ramsey MSG Brad Sand SGM Steve WettsteinLTC Bill Koski SPC (Join to see)
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SPC Nancy Greene
Thank You Sir! Never heard the ballad of Casey Jones before.My grandson loved trains.Definitely plan to share this song & story with him! Think he will ‘work’ in or on Railroad when he turns 18, he’s 9 now.LTC Stephen F.
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