Runaway Train

“Wrong way on a one way track

Seems like I should be getting somewhere

Somehow I’m neither here nor there.”

    “Runaway Train,” Soul Asylum

In the middle of the night on June 22 1918, the engineer of an empty troop train fell asleep and his locomotive smashed into a Hagenbeck-Wallace circus train near Hammond, knocking over kerosene lamps and causing a fire that killed 86 people and injured more than a hundred others.  Based in Peru, Indiana, Hagenback-Wallace at the time was the second largest traveling circus, surpassed only by Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey.  Among those who later performed for Hagenback-Wallace were lion tamer Clyde Beatty, clown Emmett Kelly, cowboy Hoot Gibson, and comedian Red Skelton.

Tuesday morning fire ravaged an apartment near Purdue North Central in Westville.  Fortunately nobody was hurt. Former softball teammate Terry Hunt and his family live three units down from the blaze; Terry's son Travis captured several vivid shots.

From Anchorage, Alaska, Bill Pelke sent me a copy of “Journey of Hope: From Violence to Healing.”  The moving memoir contains a foreword by Sister Helen Prejean, author of “Dead Man Walking.”  The grandson of murdered Bible teacher Ruth Pelke, Bill fought successfully to prevent Paula Cooper, 15 when she and others stabbed their victim to death, from being executed in the electric chair.  In a chapter entitled “The Epiphany in the Crane,” the former steelworker described imagining his “Nana” with tears flowing down her cheeks and discerned that, in his words, “they were tears of love and compassion for Paula Cooper and her family.”

I mailed Pelke a copy of my 80s Shavings, entitled appropriately “The Uncertainty of Everyday Life,” which includes an article Bill wrote entitled “Forgiveness,” where he describes writing and visiting Paula and working successfully to get her death sentence reduced.  The issue includes a memoir by Stephanie Ledbetter entitled “School Days,” about being a student at Lew Wallace, where some of Ruth Pelke’s assailants attended. Ledbetter wrote: “The despicable crime brought shame and humiliation to the entire student body and staff.” Kids from other Gary schools dubbed Wallace “Murder High” and “Terminator Institute.” She added: “Jokes were going around that students took course, entitled Firearms 101 and Stealing Cars 101 and an honors course in Felony Crimes.  It took about three years before the teasing and name-calling died away.” 

Visiting the Archives were two researchers interested in information about bank robber John Dillinger and Captain Matt Leach, who headed the Indiana State Police during the 1930s.  I showed them “Gary’s First Hundred Years,” which mentions that both the “Lady in Red” Anna Sage and the prisoner Dillinger escaped from Crown Point with, Herbert Youngblood, were from Gary.  No doubt that’s who they were looking up in the Gary city directories strewn about near them.  FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, jealous of any potential rival who might steal his thunder, pressured Indiana officials to fire Leach in 1937.  Leach and his wife died in a car accident 18 years later.

As Clark Metz’s guest I attended the annual “Hunky Hollow Athletic Club” benefit steak cookout on behalf of cerebral palsy research at St. Elijah in Crown Point.  A tradition dating back a half-century, it originated at Country Lounge, which became known affectionately as “Hunky Hollow” when it was a hangout for prominent Eastern European politicians connected to the George Chacharis political machine.  In attendance were former East Chicago mayor Robert Pastrick, Lake County sheriff John Buncich, and Lake County treasurer John Petalas, the latter a former student who was surprised to find being mentioned in Roy Dominguez’s “Valor” (confirming Roy’s assertion that his autobiography is the hot topic of conversation at the Crown Point government center).  Petalas helped arrange a meeting between Roy and Buncich in an unsuccessful effort to have them patch up their differences prior to the 2010 Democratic primary).  Having been active in politics for many years, Clark knew quite a few folks, most of whom appeared to be in their seventies or eighties.  One asked Clark what he was up to, and he deadpanned, referring to his weight, “About 210.”

Enjoying the food, sunny weather, and overall atmosphere was George Rogge, whose insurance company goes back three generations.  He mentioned being with 98 year-old realtor Bruce Ayers the day before he died, along with 50 other friends and family members and that Bruce was sharp and witty until the very end.

Tending bar was Gary Reed, who wrote an “A” paper for me on the subject of gay and lesbian life in the Region.  I got his address and promised to send him the Shavings issue containing my “Retirement Journal” where I make mention of his and other students’ oral histories.

On “Jeopardy” nobody knew that Errol Flynn wrote “My Wicked, Wicked Ways” (someone guessed Charlie Sheen) or that Woodie Guthrie penned “Bound for Glory” (one wrong answer was Bruce Springsteen). Everyone passed on who recorded “Pumped Up Kicks” (Foster the People).  “Final Jeopardy” was a killer: the only sisters nominated for Best Actress in the same year.  I thought the first contestant nailed it with Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave; the two others had no clue.  The answer, going back to 1941, was Olivia de Havilland for “Hold Back the Dawn” and Joan Fontaine, who won for her role in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Suspicion.”  De Havilland, who appeared in eight movies with Errol Flynn, including “Captain Blood” and “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” later won Best Actress Oscars for roles in “To Each His Own” (1946) and “The Heiress” (1949).