Baden, PA Train Wrecked, Mar 1941

WRECK ON PENNSYLVANIA LINES BY SABOTEURS.

SABOTEURS ARE BEING SOUGHT IN TRAIN WRECK.

FIVE PERSONS KILLED, 114 INJURED IN WRECK OF CLEVELAND TO PITTSBURGH PASSENGER TRAIN.

By William Murray -- United Press Staff Correspondent.
Baden, Pa., March 17. -- (UP) -- The federal bureau of investigation today investigated claims of Pennsylvania railroad officials that sabotage cased a Cleveland to Pittsburgh flyer to hurtle over a 40-foot embankment into the Ohio River, killing five persons.
The fifth victim, whose body was found in one of the partially submerged coaches, was identified as CONRAD LEBEL, 50, of Cleveland, a conductor who was "dead-heading" into Pittsburgh to take his run on the Pennsylvania train, Akronite.
The company reported that 114 were injured, 73 still being in hospitals, as a result of the locomotive and all five cars of the Cleveland-to-Pittsburgh train traveling at 65 miles an hour, leaving the tracks last night when the train hit a rail which had been
"deliberately" loosened, railroad officials said.
Just 18 minutes previously, the crowded, 13-car Manhattan Limited had passed the scene of the wreck a mile east of Baden. There was a possiblity that the alleged saboteurs had the Manhattan Limited as their target and officials conjectured that the track spikes may have been loosened when the limited passed over the rails.
After officials charged that someone familiar with the block signal system had loosened the rail without breaking the electric signal circuit, the FBI announced it would make a preliminary investigation to determine the cause of the wreck.
The wreck occurred a mile east of here where the roadbed parallels the Ohio River and is built up 40 feet above the water's edge. Three of the five cars were hurled into the river. The baggage car, immediately behind the tender, slipped into the water and stood upright; a smoker fell on its side in the water; a coach was caught between a clump of trees and the roadbed and partially submerged. Another coach and a Pullman were derailed but remained standing.
The engine and tender, which tore up 200 yards of main line trackage turned on their sides but did not go into the river.
The dead were:
A. R. WEIGEL, Alliance, O., the engineer.
Infant believed to be the child of MRS. ELIZABETH McDONALD, Altoona, Pa.
Woman aged about 35, believed to be MRS. JAGIELSKI, Pittsburgh.
A man identified to be HARRY C. KENNEDY, clerk accounting department, Pennsylvania railroad, Pittsburgh.
There were approximately 100 passengers on the train, No. 316, which had left Cleveland at 6:15 P.M. (EST) and was due at Pittsburgh at 9:30. The wreck was at 9:15. The coach passengers were stirring around in the aisles, collecting their luggage as they neared the end of their journey, and many of the Pullman passengers had settled down for the night, since their car was to have been attached to a New York train at Pittsburgh when the engine hit the loose rail, ploughed up the tracks and rumbled down the embankment.
A preliminary investigation showed that all 48 spikes had been removed from one rail.

Oelwein Daily Register Iowa 1941-03-17
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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!