How it was Done

When the crack New York-Buffalo Lackawanna Limited cracked up one night a fortnight ago in upper New York State, available reporters were as scarce as hen's teeth. How the United Press got the story of the wreck, in which 28 died in live steam, made a yarn for pressroom spinning. Seldom had improvised telephone coverage, which newspapers and news associations constantly use, turned out so successfully.

Hero of the story was Hudson Randall, a 16-year-old, 200-lb. six-footer who plays tackle on the high-school football team at Dansville, N.Y. and in his spare time picks up pocket money working as stock boy in a Murphy 5 & 10.

About 7 p.m. Hudson Randall was in Milligan's drug store on Dansville's Main Street, talking about the wreck over a malted, when the phone rang. Druggist E. T. Milligan answered. The man on the other end of the line was Pete Ellis, night rewrite man for the United Press in New York.

U.P. Night Editor Miles Vaughan was in a pickle. He had to have the story of the wreck, which was at Wayland, seven miles from Dansville. But his nearest staff correspondent was in Rochester, 45 miles away, and could not be immediately reached. Was there anyone who was reasonably intelligent in the store at the moment? Was there anyone there who wanted a job? Who, When, Where, What. Druggist Milligan summoned Hudson Randall to the phone. Rewriteman Ellis gave his instructions--try to find out what caused the wreck; try to learn exactly how many people were killed, and how many injured; get their names and addresses and be sure to get the spelling straight; and call back every half hour or so. Hudson said sure, and off he went, in a flivver commandeered from a chum.

The only other newsman at Wayland when Hudson arrived was the editor of the Wayland weekly Register. Hudson talked first with a Wayland station employe, got an estimate of the casualties, plus a graphic, first-person eyewitness description of what had happened.

He then telephoned Ellis, delivered the details.

Next he went to the Allen Funeral Home in Wayland, got names and addresses of victims from a list compiled from steam-soaked ration books. He called New York again.

At other funeral homes, the Wayland Hospital and Wayland's Masonic Temple (where some injured were being treated), he got more names. Survivors gave him their versions of the accident. Then, when A. H. McLaughlin, the railroad's chief dispatcher, arrived from Buffalo, Hudson was an unnoticed bystander while the preliminary investigation of the wreck's cause got underway.

By the time U.P.'s own correspondent arrived from Rochester, hours later, and other professional newsmen began coming in, Hudson Randall had his story pretty well by the tail, had put U.P. ahead of A.P. on some names of victims, some wreck details.

Said Editor Vaughan: "He did a good job and was very accurate." Said Hudson: "It was fun. But I'd rather be a lawyer."

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