The Biggest Littlest City In America

In 1896 a city sprang up over night which had the second highest population in the state of Texas, after one day it was left almost abandoned. What happened at Crush?

Well, the name was very apt, because the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad had decided to put on spectacle that involved two 30 ton steam engines crashing into each other, but the name actually comes from the idiot train worker that had come up with the idea.

This wasn’t a new idea, in May of the same year two trains had been crashed into each other in Ohio in a newly built park as a publicity stunt. As the park, which was named Buckeye Park, was mainly accessed by train, the train company made money by putting on special train journeys to the area as well as hiring out plots of land around the area for other entertainment. The crash went off without that much of an issue and the crowd enjoyed the show and gleefully climbed aboard the wreckage, all trying get a souvenir of the day. All but T.P. Peck were happy because in a major case of foreshadowing, he had been hit by a bolt and suffered a broken leg, but he was quickly taken to hospital and no one really noticed or cared about him.

William Crush, buoyed by the success of the Buckeye Park, proposed that his train company, the “Katy”(taken its “M-K-T” initials) do the same thing. The train company had recently upgraded their train engines from 30 ton to 60 ton, so they had a few to get rid of and higher management jumped at the idea. The place that they decided to do this was at a site 14 miles north of Waco and building began in earnest.

An elevated track was built so the public could have a better view, two telegraph offices were erected, a grandstand built and even a Ringling Brothers Circus tent was put up. Special excursion trains were put on by the train company and tickets were priced at $3.50(equivalent to $114 in todays money) and the public came in their thousands, in some cases riding on top of the trains as there was no room inside the carriages, I wonder if they got a discount?

40,000 people turned up on the day to witness the drama and they made use of the lemonade and cigar stands, carnival games and medicine shows that had popped up by quick thinking business people. Luckily though there were some safety measures employed by the organisers, for instance the public were restricted to a minimum of 200 yards, although the press were allowed to be only 100 yards away which came back to haunt them.

The crowd were unhappy about having paid so much and being held so far back and as a consequence the crash was delayed for an hour while the police tried to get them under control (defend the police, am I right!).
After the kerfuffle, the train posed for a photo op before pulling up to their designated spots before beginning their last journey.

Crush, seated on white horse, dropped a hanky to signal the start of the vehicles final approach and then did one back to safety (he wasn’t that dumb).
The trains approached each other at a speed of 45 miles an hour over a quarter of a mile and the resulting crash, literally blew peoples heads off!

A quote from one person read:
“A crash, a sound of timbers rent and torn, and then a shower of splinters… There was just a swift instance of silence, and then as if controlled by a single impulse both boilers exploded simultaneously and the air was filled with flying missiles of iron and steel varying in size from a postage stamp to half of a driving wheel.”

A moment after this picture was captured photographer Joe Deane was blinded in one eye by flying debris

The carnage was unprecedented, yet should have been obvious, panic broke out in the crowd as they ducked and covered to get out of the way flying debris. Two people died and six others were seriously injured, but the human spirt/greed endured and the crowd swarmed the wreckage trying to get a souvenir of the occasion. Several people suffered burns as the pipes were still hot cos steam…

The crash, rightfully, made national headlines and Crush was fired the next day but was quietly rehired and although he spent the next several decades with the company, he never tried to restage “The Crash at Crush”.
The victims were paid off with nominal payments and lifetime rail passes, just what you need for your PTSD.

Despite the disaster, several rail crashes were performed for publicity reasons over the following years.
Who say’s you can’t teach an old 19th century train baron new tricks?