For the latest news visit qchron.com 42 ND ANNIVERSARY EDITION • 2020
QUEENS CHRONICLE, Thursday, November 12, 2020 Page 8
C M ANN page 8 Y K 1950
TRIUMPH OVER TRAGEDY
Holiday horror topped a terrible year LIRR’s worst crash ever, in Kew Gardens, killed 78, helped fuel state takeover by Michael Shain Chronicle Contributor
n T h a n k s g i v i n g Eve , almost exactly 70 years ago, 78 people were killed and twice as many injured when a Long Island Rail Road express train slammed into the back of a stalled local in Kew Gardens. It was the worst disaster in the history of the LIRR, the nation’s oldest and busiest rail line, and the catastrophic capstone to perhaps its worst year ever. There was no shortage of people to blame. If you never heard of the Kew Gardens LIRR crash on Nov. 22, 1950, you are hardly alone. New Yorkers have notoriously short-term memories when it comes to tragedy and disaster. How many have heard of the sinking the steam ferry General Slocum in the East River that killed more than 1,000 people — most of them women and children — in 1904? Or the Malbone Steet wreck in 1918, when a BMT subway train derailed in Flatbush, killing 93 people — the deadliest subway accident in U.S. history? Even the events of 9/11 seem to be fading with every passing year. Nevertheless. the death toll from the 1950 LIRR crash was a shock wave that rolled through the city like deadly fog. It was the beginning of the end for private railroads in the Northeast and led to the first steps in the creation of the MTA. It was a tragic lesson in what happens when infrastructure is neglected and safety measures shrugged. Let’s start at the beginning. Because it was evening rush, both LIRR trains were packed, each carrying more than 1,000 passengers. Holiday travelers added to the load. Every seat was taken and a large-but-unknown number of people were standing in the aisles. Just before 6:30 p.m., the operator of a Hempstead-bound train heading into Jamaica station was directed by the trackside signal lights to slow down, then stop at a spot 2,000 feet outside the Kew Gardens station. When he tried to restart the train, the brakes would not release. The 12-car train was locked in place. Behind the Hempstead train, the operator of a train headed for Babylon was stopped as well. When the signals changed, it is theorized, the Babylon operator started up again after misreading a “proceed” light
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half a mile ahead that had parkways and, later, the Long been intended for the stalled Island Expressway, was an train in front of him. easy alternative within reach By the time the Babylon of just about everyone. train passed under the LefThe disastrous events of ferts Avenue overpass, it was 1950 and the widespread fear traveling at 35 mph, not that the railroad was unsafe enough time to slow down only encouraged more people before slamming into the to take the car instead. Hempstead train stalled a In the wake of the Kew block from the trestle over Gardens disaster, New York Metropolitan Avenue. State started making its first The first car of the Babycontributions to the railroad’s lon t rain telescoped on operation. impact, crushing scores of “It was a fraction of what passengers to death. they get today,” said Penner. Police said the only way The subsidies were small, but they were able to identify the marked the start of what operator’s body was by the would eventually become the LIRR-issued work glove on MTA. his right hand. T h ree d ays af ter the Photos from that night crash, Gov. Thomas Dewey show the last car of the told reporters he estimated Hempstead train had been the railroad needed $50 miltossed in the air by the crash Looking west from the site of the crash toward the Lefferts Avenue Bridge. The Babylon train passed lion to get back on its feet. and come down on top of the under the overpass and could not stop in time to avoid the stalled train. As a result of the Kew PHOTO BY MICHAEL SHAIN lead car of the Babylon train. Gardens disaster, the Pennsy Newspaper accounts of the crash blamed the signalman aboard the crossing — and the elegant, elevated agreed to take the LIRR out of Hempstead train for failing to set out tracks on Rockaway Beach Boule- receivership and begin upgrading the were horrific. “Passengers standing in the aisles flares warning approaching trains vard originally built for the railroad line. In exchange, the state agreed the — ever since. didn’t have a chance,” a conductor they were stalled. railroad could stop paying taxes on It seems hardly a coincidence now its properties and revenues. Another faulted the operator of told the Daily News. Doctors climbed ladders up the the Babylon train who’d misread that the LIRR, then privately owned The necessity of paying local taxes by the Pennsylvania Railroad, filed for had “left the [LIRR] at a permanent steep embankment in the dark, the signal. The accident was not an isolated bankruptcy in 1949, the year before. then squeezed into the wreckage competitive disadvantage,” according Like the then-privately owned sub- to historian Joe DeMay’s account incident, however. to treat the injured. Amputations In fact, it was the ways, if the LIRR wanted to hike published by the Kew Gardens Hiswere performed on the second horrendous- fares, it had to ask the New York torical Society. “The Long Island s p o t , ly deadly crash on State Public Service Commission for Rail Road had to compete for the accord i ng t h e L I R R t h a t permission, said Larry Penner, a his- public’s transportation dollars with to reports. torian and retired official of the Fed- the various New York State authoriyear. Rescuers I n Febr u a r y, eral Transit Administration. with acetyties that owned and operated the “From 1918 to 1947, every time bridges, tunnels and highways.” The two trains had lene torches collided head on they asked for an increase, it was change bought the Pennsy a few had to cut free at the Rockville denied,” said Penner, of Great more years of private ownership but many of the Centre station. Neck, LI. survivors. the handwriting was on the wall. After nearly 30 years without a Thirty-two peoE v e r y Eventually, New York State took fare hike, “they had no capital money over the LIRR lock, stock and barrel ple were killed. Queens detecIn August, to invest in the system. That clearly in 1965. tive on duty that a passenger contributed to the crash.” night was “Gov. Rockefeller realized he had Tragically, it was the Pennsy that a constituency on Long Island and train missed a assigned to the sig n a l a nd had developed the best train signal he wanted to keep them happy,” crash site a nd sideswiped a safety system in the country, state of Penner explained. ever y patrol freight train the art for its time, which it deployed wagon was pressed It helped too that President Lynnear Hun- all around the Northeast. But it never don Johnson had pushed through into service as an tington sta- installed the system on the Long Congress in the mid-1960s the first ambulance, the tion. No one was killed, Island line because it was too expen- federal aid to local public transporNews reported. but 41 people went to the hospital. Homes near the tation systems. Money at last started sive, according to Penner. The calamities of 1950 didn’t stop site of the crash were commandeered Ridership on the railroad was to flow. there. by authorities to treat victims. The agency that oversaw the LIRR already beginning to spiral down and In May, a fire destroyed an 1,800- the LIRR was starved for cash. A temporary morgue was set up in was dubbed the MCTA, the Metrothe driveways of the private homes foot section of the train trestle over In the years after World War II, politan Commuter Transportation Jamaica Bay, cutting off service to more people were moving out of the Authority, to reflect its new stewardon 125th Street. I m mediately, investigations the Rockaways just before the start of city to the suburbs, no doubt. But ship of the line. began, including one by the Queens the busy summer season. It wasn’t until two years later, after along with the house in Levittown The LIRR never repaired it and, came an automobile. district attorney, who was looking for the state took over the New York City years later turned the bridge over to criminal liability. The car was king and the drive to subways too, that the name was Q One of the reports that followed the city. The A train has used the bay New York City via the new state changed to simply the MTA.
