Peering at the Past – All Were Possible Passengers

Two young, probably teenage, cousins were on a passenger train from Houston, Minn., to visit relatives in Northfield, when they understood the conductor to say, “The coach is on fire.” But when the train stopped, they were the only ones to grab their coats and baggage in preparation to detrain. What the conductor had actually said was, “There’s a colt in the wire.” Two train employees got off, freed a young horse from its entanglement in a barbed -wire fence and then reboarded as if it were nothing unusual. The relatives in Northfield were two sisters, also from Houston but attending college around 1920, one of which became a Houston-area historian. Ingrid Julsrud included that family tale while writing an invaluable account of railroading in her hometown during the first two decades of the 1900s.

A freight train arrived about 9 a.m., the first of six, which for almost 100 years, stopped in Houston every day except Sunday. There were two freight trains and four passenger trains. The freight trains might be in town two hours or more while switching – leaving behind just unloaded, empty box cars and picking up box cars loaded with local produce.

During the first two decades of the 1900s, agriculture was the lone local industry, so the two daily freight trains departed with cattle, hogs, chickens, eggs, butter, corn and grain – hundreds of pounds every month.

That morning train arrived from the west, while the 5 p.m. freight train approached from the east. That evening train brought the most merchandise, picking up freight from three mainline railroads servicing La Crosse. Julsrud wrote, “It seems most shipping was done to and from the east. Everything from a paper of pins to a threshing machine or a pound of coffee to a ton of coal came in by train.”

The first passenger train arrived at noon, just when Julsrud (born 1900) and her classmates were dismissed from school to go home for their noon meal. That train carried the most mail and the most people, including traveling salesmen and their large trunks of samples. The registered or insured mail was transported only during daylight hours.

Passenger trains had four coaches behind the engine and coal car. First came the baggage car with everything that was not mail or people. However, it might carry a deceased person being returned for burial. Behind the baggage car was the mail car where a mailman was busy sorting and bagging mail.

The third car was “the smoker” for those who were smoking, which in those days did not include women. The fourth and final car was the main passenger car. It happened sometimes that it was so crowded that some women and children had to ride in the smoker. Julsrud noted, “This was so embarrassing and an experience talked about for days afterwards.”

The second passenger train, which arrived about 2:30 p.m., was choice for those going to shop in La Crosse. It was usually a fast 30-minute trip. It stopped in Hokah for just a few minutes and in La Crescent just long enough for people to change to the train heading north to stops including Winona. It would stop at the Mound Prairie Store only if it was flagged down.

Julsrud found it interesting to ride into South La Crosse past many of the prominent industries of the day. There was Montague’s Biscuit Company, which made cookies and crackers for grocery stores. Behind the La Crosse Pearl Button Factory, passengers could see large piles of clam shells with holes in them where buttons had been punched out. The factory closed when river pollution caused the clams to disappear.

The ride ended at the La Crosse depot, a two-story structure with a taller stone tower, an impressive sight until being destroyed by fire on Christmas Eve, 1916.

There were two evening trains, one arriving from La Crosse about 8 p.m., which in addition to passengers and baggage, brought mail and the highly-anticipated evening newspapers. Paper boys eagerly awaited the arrival to pick up their bundles and rush off to make their deliveries. Good weather might attract quite a crowd, which might even inhibit incoming passengers from getting off.

The last train of the day approached from the west at midnight. Those still awake could identify the change of sound as the train crossed the bridge at Cushon’s Peak. “We could also tell how close the train was by the number of whistles,” wrote Julsrud, “one for each crossing, private or public. The second whistle was at the Hempstead crossing and the third for the Money Creek road.” As the train neared town, there were the unmistakable sounds of the engine blowing off steam, the air brakes engaging and finally the screeching stop at the station.

Riding on passenger trains was a safe and enjoyable experience, far more relaxing and comfortable than the stagecoach rides of the preceding era of passenger travel. Passenger trains, in addition to transporting people and postal mail, were also the rural ambulances of that era. Despite having two capable doctors in Houston, there were situations that required extra care. The patient was placed on a cot and carried by four to six men to the train depot and into the baggage room. When the train arrived, the patient was lifted into the baggage car and taken to La Crosse. The depot agent in Houston would wire ahead so there would be an ambulance waiting at the depot in La Crosse for the final leg of the trip to the hospital.

If a hospitalized person was determined terminally ill and desired to die at home, the request could be granted with the help of the railroad. Julsrud wrote about the last train ride of Mrs. Ole Laugen, who lived on a farm just below Cushon’s Peak. “The tracks ran behind the house and along the barnyard, so when the train reached her home, it stopped and the trainmen carried her into the house.”

Source: Remembering Old Times, Houston During the Post Card Era by Ingrid Julsrud, 1993.