William A. Pearce prevented a train from being wrecked and saved the passengers and crew, Elsmere, Delaware, June 6, 1913. Careless workmen left a heavy plank lying across the high rail of a track on a curve on which a passenger train was approaching at a speed of 55 m.p.h. While Pearce, 27, brakeman, was walking toward the train between it and the plank, his attention was called to the plank by the excited cry of another man. He turned and started to run toward the plank. The train was then 245 feet from Pearce, who was 35 feet from the plank. The engineer was intent on observing a signal nearby and did not know of his danger. Pearce ran beside the track until he was 10 feet from the plank, then he ran between the rails to the plank, grabbed it without pausing when the locomotive was about 80 feet from him, and ran off the track. As he ran over the ballast just outside the rail, he stumbled and fell. Before he got to his feet, the locomotive passed him at undiminished speed. 11048-1034
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