The Omaha Sunday Bee
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OMAHA, SUNDAY MORNING, JANUARY 12, 1903.
SINGLE COPY FIVE CENTS.
JOHN J. SULLIVAN VETERAN KNIGHT OF THE THROTTLE
J Simple Story of a Han Who for More, Than Forty Years Has Followed tixo Exciting and Dangerous Calling of Engineer and Modestly Says -"There's Nothing to It."
IT U bo fault ot John J. Sullivan that the casualties ca
American railroads are to great Mr. Sullivan ha been
engineer tor mora than forty years, he. haa drawn the finest
and the fastest passenger trains tn the country, la bis
handa hare been placed the HvA ot hundred ot thousands
of human beings and he haa whirled fJylnexprasa trains acosa the
country an aggregate of millions of miles. But never In these forty
years has a alngle one ot his passengers been killed and none have
been Injured through any fault ot his. This remarkable record
stands almost without a parallel In the history of railroad engineer
ing in this country. '
Mr. Sullivan Is now a citizen of Omaha- He moved to thla city
In September coming from North Platte, where he lived tor many
years, that being the end of the locomotive run which be had on the
Union Pacific. .'When. In accordance with the rulea and regulationa
of the company, he reached the age limit three years ago he retired
on the pension provided by the company of l00 a year. On thla
sum he Is now enjoying the fruit of his long service, taking life easy
like an old warrior who has been through many battlea and haa
lived to tell the tale. But this old engineer Is un scarred by the or
deals through which he haa come. For a man of 67 years he U re
markably alert and active. A little man with weather beaten face
seamed by winter's cold and summer's heat during the years that he
spent flying at high speed across the plains of Nebraska Is John J.
Sullivan. With his keen blue eyes, his ragged moustache, his firm
Jaw and his straight lips he is the typical engineer, the type ot the
man who thinks it nothing to take hla life In his hands and who doe
cot know the meaning of the word fear from personal experience of
the emotion
Danger a Daily Companion
It you ask this firm-Jawed little man about the experiences ot
four decades during which he sat almost every day with hia hand
on the throttle of a great mountain ot Iron apd flew through
the country on the front of a mighty thousand-ton battering ram ot
steel and Iron rushing at the rate of a mile a minute over two nar
row bands of track, the little man will laugh, wave his hand depre
ciatingly and remark with a liberal Irish brogue that. 'There's noth
ing to it. I Just ran trains, that a alL"
Which recalls the remarks ot the man who waa one of the
famous "600" who "Into the valley of death thundered. This man
saw no reason for glorying In the bravery of the deed. "We got
orders to storm the position, y'know," said he. "And so we stormed
it." "But wasn't it fearfully dangerous?" they asked. "O, I expect
it was some dangerous." he said, and added. "All war la, jTknow."
Maybe these heroes lack imagination. Maybe they lack an
appreciation of the bravery of their dally deeds merely because they
are their daily duttea. "Familiarity makes commonplace," la an old
proverb and a true one. But viewed from the standpoint of the
average man the locomotive engineer is one of the bravest of men;
he runs greater risks than any other men and at the same time he
carries In his hands not only hla own Ufa but the lives ot those in
the train behind him.
"Jack" Sullivan had lived In a good school for the cultivation of
the courage, "nerve" and coolness required in an engineer for he
had aeen some exciting service In the confederate army at the open
ing ot the civil war. He waa born in Brookfleld. "Mass., June 12,
1840. His father waa a sturdy pioneer having come over from land
lord burdened Ireland to try to hew a living from a rock ribbed New
England farm. There John spent his boyhood like the average New
England farm bey, doing chores and putting in hla spare time pick
ing stones. But it waa not quite all work and no play for Jack,
He found a little' time tor playing base ball and he early became a
leader in this sport, being the star of the Brookfleld team away back
there In the '60s.
Harper's Ferry and the War
When he was 12 years old he was sent south to fife with a sla
ter in Richmond. Va. As he grew up he began to show his taste
for a life of adventure and of possible danger. He enlisted In the
army when he was only 19 years old. He waa assigned to duty at
the United States arsenal at Harpers Ferry. He was on duty there
at the time It was stormed by the famous "Osawatomle" John
Brown and later he was at the last scene ot the tragic career ot that
enthusiastic pioneer abolitionist.
"It was In December. 1869." he says. "John Brown had been
tried for the crime of treason and had been convicted and sentenced
to, death for attacking the arsenal. I was assigned to guard duty
at the gallows the day of his execution. I shall never forget the
look on hla face aa he walked up the scaffold steps. He did not
seem in the least afraid though he waa weak with long confinement
In the close air of the prison. I was very patriotic but I could not
help feeling that there waa a man being hanged for a crime which
While technically treason was not really that- Within a year the
great civil war had began to settle the very question which John
Brown had tried to settle by taking weapons forcibly from the gov
ernment arsenal.
When the war began Pull It in found himself, almost before be
knew it. a member of the rebel army. He fought perforce because be
had to fight under the stars and bars of the confederacy, and gained
a creditable and honorable record. He knew personally some ef the
famous leaders ot the confederacy such as General "Joe" Johnson.
But his northern sympathies brought about a revolt against the
cause on which he was fighting and to get to the north he under
took the dangerous expedient of deserting and running the blockade.
He left the camp one night and made hia way through forests and
morasses, across rivers, plains and mountains, swimming, rafting,
rowing, undergoing great hardships and risking his Ufa at every
atep. But he finally got within the onion lines. 0
Railroading in the Sixties
Railroading In those days waa In it Infancy and It offered an
exciting career for a young man so Inclined, particularly aa the
relels had a pleasant little way ot burning bridges and removing
rails whenever they got the chance, thus providing sudden surprises
for the engineer and all other human beings on the train. Sullivan
applied for a position on the Baltimore & Ohio railroad and became
a wiper In the roundhouse In 1863. Men were scarce and 6ulllvan
showed the proper stuff ln him. so It waa only two months till he
was made a fireman and aent out oa one of the primitive engines
which In that day were perambulating up and down the track ot that
line which became so famsua for Its serpentine shape. He was a
fireman for three years, during which time he encountered sundry
and divers adventures In connection with the unsettled condition of
the country during the war. In 18C6 he waa given hla first engine.
"It was one of those hook motion engines," says Mr. Sullivan.
We used to call them 'grasshoppers.' I guess because they Jumped
and Jerked something like that Insect. No, the B. A Ol was not
quite as tine a line as the Union Pacific is today, and I don't think
there Is very much exaggeration In that story about the road being
so full of curves that the engineer could often light his pipe from
the rear brakeman as the caboose passed the engine. There are two
objections to this story, though. One Is that the engineer being in
the place where all the fire Is wouldn't need a light tor his pipe and
the other la that engineers dldnt have time to smoke their plpea
while they were running one of those grasshoppers and especially on
the B. A O. track, which, aa I said before, waa not wonderful for its
smoothness."
- Meantime stories were coming out ot the west of tha building of
the Cnlon Pacific road. It ran through a country almost primeval,
where the red men still amused themselves by killing train crews
and by pulling bp the Iron rails which the white man had laid for
his iron horse to travel over. The prospect of adventure appealed to
Sullivan. He thought he would like to run aa engine on this new
JOHN J. SULLIVAN.
road. Bo he resigned hla place with the Baltimore ft Ohio and came
w me spring or
He stopped first In Kansas City. Business In his line was very
dull. But the base ball season was Just opening up. So "Jack"
Sullivan abandoned for a time the throttle and took up the willow
Btick, for his fame aa a base ball player was not unknown even In that
far western frontier and there were "fans" already In that early day
supporting the game. He played with the Kansas City ball team
all that summer. In the fall he determined to come to Omaha and
try hla fortune on the Union Pacific, which was getting well under
operation. But there were too many engineers already. So he de
termined to push still further Into the west and to find some place
where they needed an engineer and a good one.
Life on the Union Pacific
Success did not attend him at once. So he worked on the sec
tion for two msBtha. Then a place was offered him as engineer run
ning out of North Platte and he accepted it gladly. The firemen,
however, were protesting against the employmeat of engineers who
had not served on the road as firemen. In consequence of this con
tention a number of engineers resigned. Among them was Sullivan.
He was immediately reappointed as a fireman. He waa promoted in
1876 to be an engineer and for ten years he pulled freight trains,
until in 18S6. he was advanced to the passenger service. Then for
fifteen years he was in the full bloom of his long career. His hand
held the throttle of those powerful steam monsters which whirled
across the continent such magnificent trains as the "Overland Lim
ited," the "Golden Gate Flyer" and the "Fast MalL"
Strict attention to duty, natural courage and constant coolness,
even In the face of great Impending danger, are the qualities which
have gained his enviable record for Mr. Sullivan. He has had several
narrow escapes and there were a number of instances where only his
coolness and "nerve" prevented a calamity. But in all this time dur
ing which he has drawn the fastest trains hundreds of thousands of
miles in all kinds of weather over all kinds of track he has had only
one wreck. It happened at 3 o'clock In the morning. of April 7, 1893.
Sullivan was pulling the Pacific Mail west The sky was overcast
with clouds which made the night pitch dark. A fifty-mile gale was
blowing directly against the laboring engine., Sullivan was doing hla
best to make running time against the wind. Suddenly out of the
blackness of the night a great object loomed up on the track almost
directly ahead. It was so big that at first the engineer took it to be
a building which had been blown across the track. But there waa
no time to speculate. Sullivan gave the engine "the gun la the big
notch" and the next Instant it struck the black object, there was the
sound ot splintering wood, of tearing tin, of iron striking against
Iron. Then the locomotive left the track and turned over on Its
side. Frank Reed jumped. The obstruction proved to be a box car
which had been blown by the gale from a sidetrack at Cotad out on
the main line and had run down the line twelve mllea before the
wind until It ran Into the engine. The engine had plowed under
the car body and it was lifted on top of the boiler.
Souvenir of Bill Cody
Sullivan knew most of the big railroad officials of the Union
Pacific and. of course, he has "pulled" many a man of national or.
International importance. Millions of golden treasure have been
carried In the cars behind him, too. Once he was the engineer ot a
train that brought more than $50,000,000 In gold from the west. A
large force of soldiers accompanied the train aa a guard.
One of the souvenirs which Mr. Sullivan prizes very highly was
given him by Colonel Cody, "Buffalo BUI." It la a life pass tor him
self and family to the Buffalo Bill Wild West show, snd was given to
him by Buffalo BUI because Mr. Sullivan was the first engineer to
pull the Wild West show train. The pass and letter accompanylng'lt
are both written by Colonel Cody. The letter is as follows:
PHILADELPHIA, April 24. 1895. My Dear Sullivan: I take
pleasure In sending you a life pass for yourself and family, and hope
that some day you may be able to use if. This is the only life pass X
ever gave to anyone. I now have fifty cars ot my own, and shouUd
the "U. P." ever "fire" you let me know. Tour friend alwaya,
W. F. CODT.
On the reverse of the ticket Is the following:
This ticket is given to Jack Sullivan and his family, a life pas,
for being the first engineer that ever pulled the Buffalo BUI Wild
West. W. F. CODY.
The noble red man was not lacking In his reception ot the meal
who drew the early-day trains across his former happy hunting
ground. Sometimes he engaged in a pleasant little game. He fas
tened one end of a rope to the telegraph wire and the other end to
the pommel of his saddle. Then he rode away at full speed. Some
times he removed the track on which the Iron horse made Its puff
ing, snorting'way and sometimes he engaged in the game which Waa
most fascinating of all. This game consisted In stopping the train
by removing the track and then seizing the engineer and rest ot the
crew and removing their scalplocka.
"I used -to Bee evidences of these depredations, but the Indians
never disturbed me personally," said Mr. Sullivan. "I knew some of
the big chiefs, including Red Cloud, whom I saw at Pine Bluff on the
occasion of a big pow wow or treaty meeting which was held at that
place. Many Indians were present. The treaty commission pre
sented a fine gold watch to Red Cloud. He knew aa much about a
watch as be did about the machinery of my engine. But someone
told him what It was for and after the pow wow he came over to the
engine and tried to set his timepiece by the steam gauge. I had a
bard time convincing him that they were two entirely different kind
of meters.
"Mickey" Follows His Father f
Since moving to Omaha Mr. Sullivan has resided at 2T07 South
Tenth street. Ha and Mrs. Sullivan have four children. There la
D. Leo Sullivan who Is following In his father's footsteps. He Uvea
at home and Is an engineer on the Union Pacific running from
Oma'ja to Grand Island. He la better known as "Mickey." Locomo
tive engineers who do fancy work in their spare time are rare. But
"Mickey" Sullivan does and he has a remarkably artistic eye and
hand. Two sofa pillows, one embroidered with the red, white and
blue shield, emblem of the Union Pacific and the other with a pic
ture of the artist are among the productions of bis fingers.
, Frank J. SuUlvan Is chief clerk of the Helntze copper mining
plant at Bingham, Utah. William Sullivan is a machinist In Salt
Lake City. Miss Mary B. Sullivan lives at home. Her tastes are
somewhat literary and during their residence in the west she. wrote a
number of articles for the papers. Including a poem dedicated to her
brother and entitled "Mickey the Engineer," which was published
by a leading paper on its front page.
Few railway men are so widely knows and so well liked aa
"Jack" Sullivan. He numbers his friends by the hundreds. He Is
a member of Division 88, Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and
has alwaya been prominent In IU affairs. Though retired he cannot
root out from his heart the love ot the great panting Iron horses
which he has guided so many miles and one of the favorite pastimes
of his abundant leisure is to go to the station or the roundhouse and
see the big engines come In or go out. They have a personality that
Is to him quite as real as though it were human and his love for
them is as the love of man for man.
How Omaha Appeared in Its Youthful Days of 1858
.sa
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OX 4 ILS CUT. CAPITAL OF KEEKASEA TTXXITOKV
Miss Janet McKay Cowing of Senec Falls. N. T.. sends The Bee some of the residents of that time who are still citizens may be able showlnc that even in t. inf., n . ..
a drawing cut from Leslie". Illustrated Weekly of November . 1868. to recognize some of the landmark, of flft year, ago U doesn't S. 2 anJ 7.h V . 1 "
giving a view of Omaha as It than appeared. It Is poaaibl. that very sh resemble the Omaha of today and Is raU. chUflT J U.u.ted pU" of Z '
