GREEN MOUNTAIN TRAIN WRECK, MARCH 21, 1910, 8:14 AM

The Search
Not much left in Green Mountain after the storm that went thru here a couple of weeks ago. Of course, I don’t know if there was much left to Green Mountain BEFORE the storm hit, but the devastation to grain storage areas, buildings and barns, and trees it horrible.

Driving thru town, the smell of burning wood and debris is everywhere. People are still trying to pick up the pieces and put it back together again.


Green Mountain ‘town square” is a windmill and water pump in the middle of the street with a little park bench that says “Welcome.” And what is more welcoming than fresh cold well water and a bench to rest on on a hot Iowa summer day.

Checked with a couple of people in town as to the location for a marker for the train wreck. “Nope! Nothin’ like that around here.” Oh, don’t tell me that – that sounds like a challenge to me.


According to what I’d been reading, the wreck happened between Gladbrook and Green Mountain, east of the Marshall County/Tama County line. It’s only 12 miles between Green Mountain and Gladbrook. How difficult can it be to find the spot – even if the train tracks are no longer there – “4 ½ miles north of Green Mountain, just a few yard east of the Marshall-Tama county line,” said the Marshalltown Times-Republican of that date.

With my trusty MapQuest and Google maps in hand, I proceeded up and down some of Iowa’s finest dusty rural graded gravel roads. And by the clouds of dust whirling behind me, I don’t believe we have had one drop of rain here – and I know better! Up one road, down the next. I do appreciate the fact that most of Iowa’s country roads are parallel and perpendicular to each other. Makes it much easier to back-track when I don’t have to worry about which fork in the road to take! Trying to keep water towers in view (so I don’t get too lost), I continue stirring up dust. Making the adventure somewhat difficult is the fact that the gravel roads have names (probably of the farmer that lives on the road!) and my maps have the roads identified with the E-911 geo-code numbers.

Nothing – head up to Gladbrook. Stopped in the convenient store and asked about the train wreck. “There’s no marker but we do have a museum, you can call and make an appointment, they have lots of stuff from the wreck.” (Note to self: Call Gladbrook Museum next week if all else fails.)

If there is no marker in Green Mountain, none in Gladbrook, I’ll just wander on back around the county roads and see if I can find the ‘likely spot’ of the accident.

Heading west out of Gladbrook, I notice a long diagonal line of utility poles – bet they follow the old train bed! Keeping an eye on them, I watch for the Tama-Marshall county line marker on the highway. BINGO! There it is between Abbott Road and Zeller Road and I remember both of those coming out near Green Mountain. Whip a U-turn and head down Abbott Road, that seems like the best bet since the accident was “a few yards east” of the line.

And there it is – the spot where the utility lines cross Abbott Road. Stop and take a picture. Consider the adventure a success and head on back to civilization (less dust and paved roads!)

Heading south on Abbot, less than ¼ mile from where I stopped to get a picture of the lines crossing the road – a spot of mown green grass, a rock, a little flag and a couple of ‘everlasting’ plastic flower bouquets. That’s it. My Gold Mine for the Day!

I left my bouquet of daisies for Bruce’s cousin who was killed in the wreck, leaned back against the truck for a few moments and tried to imagine the carnage, the confusion of that day. Knowing the distance from Marshalltown I had traveled, imagining what it must have been like to travel it with horse and wagon or in the few automobiles available at the time, not knowing what I would find at the end.
What they found at the end was the remains of the Rock Island Nos. 19 and 21 trains reduced to piles of torn metal, wooden kindling and shattered glass along with scores of wounded and dead, bodies mutilated and dismembered, possibly beyond recognition.

The Wreck






The above pictures are archival photos from area newspapers.

On March 21, 1910, 52 people were killed and scores injured as the lead engine of two Rock Island trains suddenly left the tracks and hit a clay embankment. The sudden stop caused the steel cars to telescope into the two wooden cars.

A wreck west of Cedar Rapids, IA earlier in the day had caused the need to detour the Rock Island trains. No. 21, the St. Louis-Twin Cities passenger, and No. 19, the Chicago-Twin Cities passenger, both west bound. The trains were joined and re-routed on the Chicago-Great Western line. Combined, the two trains, pulled by Engine No 820 and Engine No 1009, totaled ten coaches.

Lead Engine No 820 left the track, pulling the other one with it making a deep cut, ten or twelve feet deep, thru a bank of clay. In the wet clay, the engines came to a sudden halt and toppled over. The sudden stop caused the cars behind the engine to telescope into the other cars.

The Colonia, a Pullman with a heavy metal superstructure, was behind the engines. Behind the Colonia, were the smoking car and a ladies' day coach. These two cars, structured primarily of wood, accounted for the heaviest loss of life and the greatest number of injuries.

As the smoking car followed by the ladies’ day coach continued forward, the heavy metal structure of the Pullman cut into the wooden cars, “turning them into matchsticks,” according to one eye-witness. It first cut thru the smoker, turning it to rubble and killing or injuring all in the car, then pushed the smoker into the ladies’ day coach, killing or injuring all 80 women and children in that car.

Bodies from the two coaches were horribly crushed, mutilated, and dismembered and taken to Marshalltown for identification. A temporary morgue was set up at 17 South Center Street. “Up to a late hour this afternoon thirty-two dead had been accounted for, but only four had been identified,” reported the Marshalltown Times-Republican. It was a long slow tedious process.

Center Street, Marshalltown, IA. Today there is no 17 Center St, the appliace store is 13 Center St and the yellow brick is 19 Center St.
No official cause was ever released for the wreck. However, it was reported that “the arrangement of cars was ideal for death. The Pullman crashed back thru the more flimsy cars like paper,” leading to changes in the arrangement of the coaches.