excerpt
“That I’ll be enjoying your city’s hospitality a while longer. I’m
curious, too.”
SURPRISE CHARGE IN HOBO HEARING
Local Man Named and Defended in Derailment
Council Hears Public on Vagrant Question
A city councilman yesterday
backed down from his charge that a
local man and a vagrant caused the
September 17 freight train derailment
in which a man died. During
testimony by Police Chief Darwin
Spanger at a council hearing on
hobos, Councilman Frank Stout
suggested that the accident was the
result of sabotage by Peter James, a
longtime resident, and a hobo
named Fred Clarkson.
James and Clarkson rescued the
engineer of the overturned locomotive
before a burning gasoline tank
car behind it exploded. Stout did
not mention them by name, but
referred to “the hobo and his
accomplice.” The train’s brakeman,
Maurice d’Aleppo, died of a
heart attack during the crash.
James, known as “Poodie,” lives on
the site of the old Thorp ranch off
River Road. At the hearing, Clarkson
identified himself as a hobo
and a former lawyer.
Chief Spanger testified that the
Great Northern Railroad found that
the train wreck was the result of
faulty maintenance, not sabotage.
Stout’s charge, later retracted,
came during a hearing in which
Mayor Peter B. Torgerson urged
the council to take action to control
what he described as a threat to
public safety by hobos who come
into town on trains. Stout said he
had raised the question of sabotage
only as a possibility. He reversed
himself following spirited defenses
of hobos and James by Clarkson
and market operator Ralph
Gritzinger.
Support for Mayor Torgerson’s
position came in testimony from
auto dealer George Pearson and
Waldemar Reinhardt, a local resident.
Great Northern Chief Counsel
Richard Brown told the council
that the railroad has no authority
over hobos beyond its property.
Chief Spanger said that in the past
12 months his department has had
only two complaints about hobos.
The council will discuss the matter
at its meeting on October 12
Libros Libertad 