Darrell W. Smith, 16, schoolboy, saved Mary Jo Watkins, 5, from being killed by a train, Highsplint, Kentucky, May 14, 1958. Mary Jo wandered unnoticed from her home and sat on a rail of a track on which a freight train was approaching at a speed of 30 miles an hour. As the train rounded a curve the engineer saw Mary Jo and sounded the horn. He also applied the emergency brakes, but the braking action was slow due to the weight of the cars which were loaded with coal. Smith noticed Mary Jo still sitting on the track as the locomotive continued to within 500 feet of her. Moving toward the oncoming train, Smith ran 165 feet to Mary Jo, stepping onto the track and into the path of the locomotive. He grasped Mary Jo about the waist with both hands and without stopping lifted her from the rail. The locomotive then was 60 feet away. Carrying Mary Jo, Smith ran from the track as the locomotive, then traveling at approximately 23 m.p.h., passed within two feet of them and stopped 1000 feet beyond them.
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