Ralph J. Schlaff, 43, factory custodian, saved David R. Klumpp, 6, schoolboy, from being killed by a train, Dexter, Michigan, June 26, 1957. While pedaling a child’s model bicycle over an uneven railroad crossing, David fell between the rails of a track on which a freight train was approaching at more than 50 m.p.h. As David tried unsuccessfully to free his foot which had become entangled in the wheel of the bicycle, warning signals at the crossing indicated the nearness of the train although it could not yet be seen because of a curve in the track. From the opposite side of the crossing Schlaff called to David to get off the track, unaware that his foot was caught. The train then came in sight 700 feet from the crossing and approached at unreduced speed, its crew unaware that anyone was on the track. Schlaff leaped from his automobile, which kept moving slowly, and ran 48 feet over the uneven macadam and rough timbers of the crossing into the path of the train, reaching David when the locomotive was 100 feet away. Without breaking his stride, Schlaff grasped David around the waist and dragged him and the bicycle in which his foot still was caught from the track as the train passed within 10 feet of them without stopping. Schlaff then ran 200 feet back across the tracks and overtook his driverless automobile as it moved along the street. David and Schlaff were uninjured. 44157-4148
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44157-4148