Saturday, November 17, 2007

Tales of crime and pain on the railroad

Longtime railroad special agent tells stories as exciting and dangerous as on any TV show

La Historia del Rio Abajo is a monthly column about Valencia County history written by members of the Valencia County Historical Society. It is now in its tenth year, without interruption.

The author of this month's column is a professor of History at the University of New Mexico-Valencia Campus, the vice president of the Valencia County Historical Society and the president of the Historical Society of New Mexico.

Opinions expressed in this and all columns of La Historia del Rio Abajo are the author's alone and not necessarily those of the Valencia County Historical Society or any other group or individual.

A train whistle blows in the distance as Doug Hall settles back to share some of his favorite stories about working for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad. Hall worked for the Santa Fe for a total of 32 years, from 1951 to 1983.

Hall and his wife, Bettie, even built their beautiful home near the company's tracks south of Belen in the mid 1960s. They still reside there today.

Hall spent most of his railroad career as a special agent, or chief investigator of incidents ranging from petty crimes and minor accidents to major train wrecks and business scandals. As Hall puts it, his job "covered a lot of territory."

Special Agent Hall begins the memories of his career with a story about the time he dealt with three deaths in a single day at the Belen railroad yard.

Early on that fateful day, a Santa Fe Railroad official who had arrived in Belen on company business suffered a massive heart attack at the local depot; the out-of-town visitor died instantly. Hall called Arno Romero, owner of the Romero Funeral Home, and notified Trinidad Anaya, the local coroner and justice of the peace, who immediately arranged an inquest.

Hours later, a passenger train heading for Belen wired that a passenger on the train had become ill and had died before medical help was available. Once the train arrived in Belen, Hall had the deceased traveler transported to the Romero Funeral Home and, for the second time that day, called Trinidad Anaya. Stunned by the news, Anaya convened a second inquest.

Unbelievably, a third death occurred shortly thereafter. While making his rounds, Hall had encountered a hobo in the yard. Smelling liquor on the man's clothes and breath and concerned about the fellow's safety among rolling stock and heavy equipment, Hall had chased the stranger from the yard.

Foolishly, the hobo had returned to the yard and had attempted to board a slow moving freight train heading out of town. Still intoxicated, the man had lost his grip on the car he was trying to board and had slipped beneath the train.

Rushing to the scene, Hall knew immediately that the man could not have survived his massive injuries.

With some difficulty, Hall and Arno Romero pulled the lifeless body out from under the train. Hall then phoned Trinidad Anaya to report the tragic accident and death.

The coroner could not believe his ears. Three deaths in one day were highly unusual in Belen. Three deaths in one day at the Belen railroad yard were unheard of.

A coroner's jury was organized, although it was getting hard to find six available men to serve. Even a retired railroad man on crutches was asked to serve on the jury when he came to visit friends on the work crew.

Questioning what his duties on the coroner's jury would include, the retiree learned that members of the jury would have to view the deceased. The squeamish man suddenly remembered an errand he had to run in town.

Eventually, six men were found. The group investigated the incident, viewed the body and, within moments, declared that the homeless man's death had resulted from an accident beyond the railroad's control.

Doug Hall recalls other tragic accidents resulting from failed attempts to secure rides on moving trains. In one particularly sad incident, a handsome young Mexican immigrant tried to hitch a ride on a train traveling on the tracks about a quarter of a mile west of the Rio Grande. Losing his grip, the man fell under a moving freight car. The youth's legs were crushed.

Notified in Belen, Hall raced to the scene of the accident to find the young man sitting on the tracks, staring forlornly at his injured legs. Hall ordered train traffic halted in both directions until an ambulance arrived and the man was lifted into the emergency vehicle. The ambulance had taken longer than usual to arrive because it had gotten stuck in the mud en route.

Although the fellow was rushed to the hospital on North Main Street in Belen (where the public school administration building now stands), a local physician gave little hope for his survival.

Transferring the young man to the Bernalillo County Medical Center (now the University of New Mexico Hospital), doctors succeeded in saving his life, but only by amputating both of his legs nearly to his hips. After three weeks of hospitalization, the man was deported back to Mexico.

While not responsible for the tragedy, the Santa Fe Railroad paid the injured man several thousand dollars in compensation. Hall still shakes his head at the memory, knowing that the railroad's generosity could never compensate for the life the young man might have enjoyed but for one terrible moment on the tracks west of Belen.

Hall has memories of other careless people who put themselves and even their children at risk near dangerous freight trains.

One father regularly drove his five children to their assigned school bus stop, located on the other side of an isolated railroad crossing. Arriving one day when a freight train was stopped at the crossing, the irresponsible parent instructed his kids to go under the train to get to their school bus.

In another instance, a mother was seen passing her infant over the coupling between two stopped freight cars; a waiting friend or relative reached out to receive the child on the other side of the tracks.

Fortunately, alert conductors witnessed these incidents and made sure that the trains did not resume travel before the children were out of harm's way. Hall severely reprimanded both parents for their reckless behavior.

Special Agent Hall was also kept busy investigating thefts on the railroad. The Santa Fe Railroad stretched more than 12,000 miles, from Chicago in the east to Los Angeles in the west. Valuable property moved in both directions, thanks to the hard work of thousands of honest men and women employed by the Santa Fe.

But with so many miles, so many valuables and so many people involved, devious schemes were concocted and sometimes carried out. This was when Doug Hall went to work.

In one case, large quantities of cigarettes en route to California were being stolen from Santa Fe trains on a regular basis.

Like all freight cars, those carrying cigarettes were sealed after loading at their point of origin. The seals were only broken when the cars and their cargo reached their destination, as listed on a train's manifest, or list of transported goods.

Passing through Belen, seals on cars carrying boxes of cigarettes were still intact. But the seals were broken and most of the cigarettes were gone by the time trains reached the West Coast. How could anyone have committed this blatant crime over and over in a crime spree that lasted several months?

Asked to investigate, Hall was originally stymied by this mystery. The Santa Fe Railroad grew so concerned that it sent two company officials to visit Hall and check on his investigation in Belen. Questioning Hall, the officials even implied that he might be involved in the series of robberies.

Frustrated, Hall used four vacation days to pursue the mystery far beyond his home base in Belen. Using his railroad pass, the special agent rode a passenger train to Gallup and borrowed a friend's car from which he could conduct surveillance near the Gallup rail yards.

While Hall watched the yards, it began to snow, obstructing much of his visibility. Leaving the borrowed auto, Hall lay in a snow bank and continued to look for suspicious behavior.

His determination paid off when a freight train pulled in with a carload of cigarettes. Hall saw a local switchman sneak up to the freight car, break its seal and unload several cartons of the valuable goods.

Caught red-handed, the worker was arrested, tried and convicted of taking no less than $75,000 worth of cigarettes over a nine-month period.

Further investigation revealed that the thief had regularly sold his loot to a particular man. The man, who owned several cigarette machines, had been selling the stolen cigarettes to hundreds of unsuspecting customers in western New Mexico.

Arranging a plea bargain before State District Court Judge David Chavez, each man served a nine-month prison term for his nefarious deeds.

On another occasion, Special Agent Hall was sent out of town to check into a similar series of robberies at the Houston, Texas, rail yards. This time the stolen property was liquor.

Arriving in the south Texas city, Hall went undercover, posing as a newly hired yard worker. Dressed in overalls so as to look the part, he patiently observed his fellow workers and their movements over several days.

It did not take long before Hall spotted two switchmen unloading crates of whiskey from a freight car and hauling them to a private vehicle parked nearby.

Approaching the thieves as they loaded their car trunk, Hall politely inquired if the men needed help in their labor. The pair declined Hall's offer, to which Hall suggested that they would need lots of help where they were going — to prison.

Hall revealed his true identity and apprehended the thieves. With only one set of handcuffs, Hall cuffed the two men together and escorted them to the nearest police station.

The culprits were tried, convicted and sentenced to prison terms at the Texas State Penitentiary in Huntsville.

Doug Hall is now retired from the Santa Fe Railroad and, at age 85, is recovering from hip replacement surgery. He's doing well, but a certain historian did not want to tire him out by staying too long and asking too many questions in a recent interview.

Instead, it was the other way around. After two full hours, the historian was exhausted and the "convalescent" was still going strong.

We should not be surprised by Doug Hall's energy and perseverance. These characteristics, along with his extreme dedication and strong work ethic, made him an ideal special agent for the railroad.

Only a small percentage of retirees can say that they had worked in careers that truly matched their personalities, interests and skills. Doug Hall can make this claim, to the lasting benefit of the Santa Fe Railroad, the town of Belen and the citizens of the Rio Abajo.

Dr. Richard Melzer is a professor of history at the University of New Mexico-Valencia Campus. He is the author of several books and is a longtime member and often an officer of the Valencia County Historical Society. He has been president of the Historical Society of New Mexico.

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