Ghost train stories?

[seppburgh2]

 

Ok while we are on the subject, does the NS still run through the tunnel where John Henry lost the race with the steam drill?  Have there been any reports of John hunting that tunnel?  Growing up my two heroes were Casy Jones (he had his own TV show) and John Henry (somehow back then I tired John Henry to the Miner in the CW song Big Bad John.)

 

 

[jeffhergert]

I see ghost trains all the time.  Our train line up is full of them at times.  Trains that have no power or cars assigned to them.  Trains that will run eventually, but it could be a couple days later.  Makes it hard to figure out when one is going to be going to work.

Jeff

[BaltACD]

jeffhergert

I see ghost trains all the time.  Our train line up is full of them at times.  Trains that have no power or cars assigned to them.  Trains that will run eventually, but it could be a couple days later.  Makes it hard to figure out when one is going to be going to work.

Jeff

There is a corollary to Ghost Trains - Trains that are created 'before their time'.

When I was working - Terminals were 'supposed' to give 12 hour advance notice of the need for a train that was outside the normal 'scheduled merchandise' operating plan.  The intent was for the 12 hours to allow time for the parts of the organization required to allocate resources (power & crew) to implement plans to support the train.  In reality, sometimes, 2 hours was the real gestation period - authority for the train was requested and the train called, with both power and crew being on hand at the time the train was requested.  Such happenings could leave adjoining Divisions 'holding a empty bag' where the run time for the train to a crew change point was on the order of 4 hours.

[Fred M Cain]

Anonymous

There is a book called Ghost Trains that has stories of haunted stations, bridges, tunnels, etc. You can probably get it at yor local book store.

 

 

I just happen to have this book.  It is a REALLY fun read.  It's the kind of book that after reading it, you can put it on your book shelf, then pull it back out a few years later and read it again.  When my kids were younger and still at home, they enjoyed the book as well.

 

It has a lot of neat ghost stories.  You can either read the book cover to cover or skip around from story to story.  Some of the stories are REALLY spooky.

 

The author makes no claim as to whether ghosts actually exist or not - he tends to avoid that controversy altogether.  Instead, he has merely documented and printed legends of railroad ghosts over the years.

 

You can find the book here:

 

https://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Train-American-Railroad-Legends/dp/1883089417 

 

One of my favorite stories in the book involves a catastrophic train wreck in New York’s Zoar Valley.  The Zoar Valley is sort of a spooky place to begin with.  Quite a few people have died there over the years from falls while hiking.

 

Anyhow, according to the legend, a spidery train trestle crossed the chasm right at the very deepest spot.  Late one night the train was coming (a passenger train) and the engineer saw too late that the bridge was out.  He slammed the breaks but the train crashed into the gorge anyways.  People in a nearby village could hear the screams of the dying passengers.

 

According to the legend, for many, many years later on certain dark, spooky nights, people in the village could hear the train crash and the screams of the dying passengers.

 

This legend piqued my curiosity enough that I began searching for which railroad this happened on and when.  What I discovered was that NO railroad ever crossed the Zoar at that location to begin with.  The BR & P (later B & O) bridge crossed that same river further west but was not technically in the Zoar Valley itself.  Nevertheless, I suspected that’s where the wreck happened.  I began to research this and found out that no train ever rain off the bridge there.  The bridge still stands today but that particular rail line was abandoned about 15 or 20 years ago.

 

There is another such bridge well EAST of the Zoar.  I think it was an Erie or DL&W bridge, I’m not sure now anymore.  That bridge is now part of Norfolk Southern and is still very much in use.  NS completely built a new bridge at that location as documented in TRAINS Magazine.  However, this is far enough east of the Zoar that the wreck couldn’t have happened there either.

 

So, it’s just a legend that’s all.  The author was documenting legends.  I’m not quite sure I believe in ghosts anyways.  However, ghosts seem to be very much a part of the human psyche – whatever the explanation is for that I have no idea.

 

Regards,

Fred M. Cain

[Fred M Cain]

I feel compelled to respond to my own post here.  I apologize for the fact that I didn't have my geography quite right here.  I was going too much on my own memory from the time that I researched this about 15 years ago.  Adding to my difficulty is the fact that the geography for this area really is somewhat complicated.

First of all, the large, spidery (and now abandoned) Springville Trestle on the B&P which spans Cattaraugus Creek is at the EAST end of the Zoar Valley, not the west end where I'd put it in my previous post.

The famous Portageville Trestle on Norfolk Southern that was completely rebuilt (replaced, really) is not on Cattaraugus Creek at all but spans the Genesee River gorge.

Sorry about that !

Regards,

Fred M. Cain

[scilover]

I have one here about Grim Reaper! But no really related to train..

 

[Overmod]

Grim Reaper ... if you really see the face of death on the railroad...

https://railworkersunited.storenvy.com/collections/593503-merchandise/products/25690680-poster-the-haunt-of-hunter

[SD70Dude]

Oh, that's good.  

If only it was just a joke.

[Overmod]

"Yes, be afraid.  Be very afraid"

-- Mel Brooks

[Flintlock76]

scilover

I have one here about Grim Reaper! But no really related to train..

 

 

Reminds me of the Irish legend of the banshee.  The banshee isn't like the Reaper, but is a wailing female spirit who's a harbinger of the imminent death of someone in the household, and the odd thing is, or was, only one or two people in the house will hear it, no-one else, and not necessarily the one who's going to die.

Is it true?  Actress Maureen O'Hara said she heard the banshee the night before her grandmother died.  My grandfather (on my mother's side) as a boy assisted his father and other men in burning down a tree that was supposed to have been a home for banshees.  So some believe it's true.

Americans of Irish extraction don't have to worry about banshees though, they didn't follow the Irish over here.  Leprechauns, on the other hand...

 

[M636C]

Overmod

Grim Reaper ... if you really see the face of death on the railroad...

https://railworkersunited.storenvy.com/collections/593503-merchandise/products/25690680-poster-the-haunt-of-hunter

 

Of course, in his later days, EHH looked even more like death than the cartoon....

Peter

[Fred M Cain]

Another GREAT ghost story in my personal opinion is the ghost of Silver Run on the former B&O mainline west of Grafton.  Supposedly, starting around 1910 or thereabouts, the specter of a beautiful young girl with long, black hair and a long, flowing white dress was seen near Tunnel #19 on the B&O by a number of B&O crews.

 

This story was also printed in Tony Reevy’s super fun book Ghost Trains. Sadly, the former B&O mainline across West Virginia was abandoned in the mid 1980s by CSX.

 

The old right-of-way is now a "Rail Trail" and since abandonment several hikers and cyclists have also claimed that they have seen or heard her.  This is really weird.  What is the explanation?  There is none!

 

Each individual will simply have to decide for themselves if she’s real or not.  As for me, I’m super skeptical but want to keep an open mind.

If you do a search for "The Lady in White of Silver Run" you can find quite a few references to it.  Some of the details of the story vary somewhat. By one account, she was riding on the pilot of the locomotive wailing and screaming in pain.  By another account she was seen on the pilot having a great time while waving at people.

 

Here is one version of the story as copied and pasted from a website:

 

https://www.appalachianhistory.net/2020/10/haunted-tunnels-the-silver-run-ghost-and-the-lost-tunnel.html

 

"The North Bend Rail Trail in West Virginia is known for its tunnels. Especially its haunted tunnels. 

The tunnels on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad line between Grafton and Parkersburg, West Virginia were built just after the Civil War, between 1867 and 1870. By the late 1950’s, railroad freight cars were getting taller and wider. The narrow, low tunnels on the B & O line were creating a problem area referred to as “The Bottleneck” by railroaders because of the difficulty of getting the larger trains through the tunnels. B&O decided to do a “clearance” project, widening the tunnels and raising the roofs to accommodate the new trains. 

Some of the tunnels were “daylighted”, or had their roofs removed so they were open cuts instead of tunnels as part of this project, but ten of the original tunnels remain today. Hikers and bikers pass through them regularly, most unaware of the ghostly legends connected with several of the tunnels—stories of grisly deaths, apparitions, strange noises, and frightening experiences. 

The Lady in White

Of these tales, the most well known by far is the Silver Run Tunnel’s Lady in White. Silver Run, or Tunnel 19, is located not far from the little town of Cairo, which was once famous for its marble-making industry. Today, the Silver Run tunnel and its resident ghost attracts hundreds of visitors annually to tiny Cairo.

According to the legend, a young woman waited for her betrothed at the Silver Run station. She was to be married, and was wearing a long white dress as she watched for her lover. 

…”a young woman waited for her betrothed at the Silver Run station.”

He never came. Did she fall accidentally? Or did she jump in grief and despair when she realized she’d been jilted? No one knows, but not long after her death whispers began to spread that her ghost had been seen in the tunnel. One night, an engineer reported a woman in white who appeared at the tunnel entrance just as his train was approaching. The engineer tried to stop, but there was not enough time. The train struck the woman, sending her flying off the tracks.

When the train finally stopped, the engineer and his crew searched in vain for the young woman’s body, but it was nowhere to be found. After that report, engineers regularly reported seeing the woman, and tried to avoid hitting her. Each time, the story was the same. She vanished into thin air.

One engineer decided he would not stop for the apparition. When she appeared in front of his train, he blew the whistle but did not brake. The train smashed into the woman and she sailed up and over the engine.

The telegraph office in Parkersburg began getting strange messages for every station between the office and Silver Run. A woman in white was riding on the cowcatcher of an incoming train! As the train pulled into the station, a crowd was waiting. But there was no woman in white, only a pale-faced engineer who looked like he’d seen a ghost.

 

Regards,

Fred M. Cain

[Fred M Cain]

I can also add that there are a number of versions as to just WHO the girl in white of Silver Run had been.  In the version I posted above, she was waiting for the train at Silver Run Station and either fell or was jilted by her lover and did herself in.

Hmmmn.  I'm not sure there ever was a passenger station at Silver Run to begin with.  Does anybody know?

Another version has the young girl boarding the train at Grafton (or somewhere) on her way to meet her lover in Parkersburg but she never arrived and no one knew what had happened to her.  A while later the ghostly appearances began.

Oh, and an afterthought here.  I take back what I said in my earlier post about there is no explanation.  I think I may have found the explanation.

To see the explanation, just click here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b5aW08ivHU 

Ha, ha, ha, ha ! ! ! ! !

Regards,

Fred M. Cain

[Flintlock76]

Ever hear of "The Hookerman?"  Soon you will!

(Real high-school stuff, by the way!)

https://weirdnj.com/stories/unexplained-phenomena/hookerman-spook-lights/

 

[Fred M Cain]

Flintlock,

Most interesting, I must say!  You know there have also been many, many reports of some kind of a "spook light" along Old U.S. 66 in southwest Missouri and northeastern Oklahoma.  So many people have seen it that it cannot be dismissed.  It's real whatever it is.

Back before the interstates were opened, many a traveler on Route 66 spotted the light.  A few people were even fortunate enough to capture it on film.  But what the heck is it?  I don't think there were/are any railroad tracks in the vicinity. 

Some people theorized that headlights gleaming off the clouds could somehow produce a light like that floating above the ground.  But that explanation doesn't seem too plausable either.

However, I liked the explanation about quartz being under severe pressure causing an electrical field.  That is an interesting possibility.

After I-44 was opened, people didn't drive much on the old road anymore so reports of its presence diminished.  But it has never quite gone away.

https://www.joplinmo.org/575/The-Spook-Light 

Regards,

Fred M. Cain

[Overmod]

The Silver Run question deserves a bit more study.

There's a common issue with The War Of Many Names (1861-1865) which involves place names.  The Southern names for many battles involve familiar town or context names (like Manassas) whereas the Union used features on topo maps, often watercourses (like Bull Run).  We might immediately recognize Silver Run as originating in a stream name, but there are also towns getting their name direct (like Laurel Run in Pennsylvania)

I see a GPS reference for Silver Run Station (it's on Silver Run Road):

Latitude:	39.2084121704
Longitude:	-81.1970596313
GNIS ID:	1546787

Perhaps those of you with an interest can examine this on Google Earth or comparable satellite view or research it better by location.  

 

[Fred M Cain]

Overmod,

 

Could easy be.  By all the descriptions I've read about the incident, it happened out in the middle of nowhere in front of a tunnel.  But things change.  Could there once have been a small community there? This supposedly happened about 110 years ago (if, that is it happened at all). Hmmmn. 

 

Regards,

Fred M. Cain