STILL NO JOY

 

STILL NO JOY

 

No one remembered that Mighty Casey had walked with the bases loaded to tie the game, but they did remember that a guy named Babe Ruth won the game with a sharp single to center field. They also remembered that “The Babe” went on to fame and fortune as the heart and soul of the New York Yankees, setting a home run record that lasted for decades.

…but what happened to Mighty Casey?

After the game, Casey stood silently by as the press descended into the locker room, crowding around “The Babe”. Casey was ignored. He quickly showered, dressed and left the stadium, returning to his old home in Mudville.

No one called, no one visited. Mighty Casey became a non-entity. He had no choice but to continue life with what little money he had saved as a ball player. Eventually left town in shame and headed west.

 

 

 

When he got to California, he was flat broke. He overheard two men discussing openness in the railroad business. They said that there were myriads of opportunity in trains, so Casey got a job as a coal-stoker on the Union Pacific.

He slowly worked his way up, first as a track-layer, then a signal man, later as a conductor and finally as an engineer!

As the engineer, he quickly built a reputation as a man at the top of his profession:

 

“Come all ye rounders, if you want to hear

The story of a brave engineer

Casey Jones was the rounder’s name

On the sixty-eight-wheeler he won his fame.”

 

It is one of life’s coincidences that Casey, as a ball-player, was a failure and object of infamy; as a train engineer, he not only gained fame, but had a poem of praise written in his honor.

 

 

 

 

“Casey Jones – I’m gonna drive her.

Casey Jones – ‘til he leaves the rails

Casey Jones – I’m gonna drive her

For I am eight hours late by that western rail”

 

“Headaches, heartaches and all kinds of pain

Are not apart from a railroad train,

Tales that are earnest, noble and grand

Belong to the life of this railroad man.”