A Head-on Collision on the Glendale and Montrose Railway

The Crescenta Valley had its own electric trolley line, the Glendale and Montrose Railway, which ran from south Glendale all the way up to La Crescenta. The line ran from 1913 to 1930 and was critical to the development of the Crescenta Valley. However, there was a major accident on the line in the mid-‘20s.

The Glendale and Montrose (G&M) had just purchased a brand new electric locomotive to pull flatcars of lumber up to Montrose for the building boom then happening. One morning, the new locomotive was parked on a siding in Verdugo Park. In front of it was an empty flatcar, perhaps set to be loaded with lumber from Litchfield Lumber in downtown Glendale, to be hauled up Verdugo Canyon to the Crescenta Valley.

Someone had not set the brakes properly on the waiting flatcar and it began to roll on the slight downhill toward downtown Glendale. The heavy flatcar quickly picked up speed, rolling off the siding and onto the main line in the center of Verdugo Road and crossing the bridge over the Verdugo Creek, near where Glendale College is today.

Two men working on the locomotive looked up and saw the flatcar quickly disappearing down Verdugo Road. They knew they had to stop it before it rolled out of control through the downtown area. They jumped on the locomotive and hit the power to chase it down. Traveling fast, they began to gain on the unoccupied flatcar as it barreled down the center of Verdugo passing Glenoaks Boulevard. One of the men stayed on the throttle while the other man climbed onto the very front of the locomotive, intending to jump onto the flatcar and turn the brake wheel.

They were now on Glendale Avenue heading south into downtown. As they passed Monterey Road, then Doran Street, they caught up to the flat car and the man on the front prepared to make the jump. Because the two men were so focused on the flatcar they didn’t see a steam locomotive just passing Broadway heading north towards them on the same track. As they passed Lexington Drive, and then California Avenue, their electric locomotive touched the flatcar and the man made the leap and landed on the flatcar. That’s when they saw the steam locomotive heading directly toward them.

Both locomotives hit the brakes and skidded – but it was too late. They were both moving too fast. They hit! The flatcar, and the unfortunate man on it, was sandwiched between the heavy electric locomotive and the even heavier steam locomotive. The flatcar exploded from the impact, crushing the man who had hoped to stop the wreck. Wood and dust from the flatcar flew into the air. The poor man caught between the two locomotives was horribly mangled and survived for a few hours before dying. The flatcar was a total wreck but the sturdy locomotives were relatively unharmed.

Walking on the sidewalk near the crash was a little boy on his way to school. He witnessed this horrific crash and it made a huge impression on the young boy. His name was Ward Kimball. Despite the trauma of seeing the crash, or maybe because of, Kimball grew up to be a huge rail fan. He also became a top animator for the Disney animation studios, animating such classics as “Cinderella” and “Peter Pan”.

Ward probably told the story of the crash a hundred times to his fellow animators. In 1950 the animators at Disney created the cartoon “The Brave Engineer”, the true story of Casey Jones in a horrific head-on collision between two locomotives. Of course, they thought of their fellow animator Ward Kimball and his own story of witnessing a head-on collision. The cartoon image of Casey Jones bears a not-coincidental resemblance to a young Ward Kimball and, as the cartoon station master checks his list of train engineers, “W. Kimball” can be seen on the list.

That’s just an interesting side note to a sad tragedy that happened a hundred years ago involving our own little Glendale and Montrose Railway.