The LaCygne Weekly Journal Linn County Friday July 2, 1899 Wind, Hail, Rain. Linn County Swept by a Terriffic Storm. The Worst Storm In Years Does Untold Damage--Buildings, Orchards, and Growing Crops Ruined. The worst storm ever known here swept down from the northwest last Thursday evening, doing incaluable damage throughout the eastern part of Linn couty. The storm was made up of wind, hail, rain and lightning, and it would be impossible to tell which of the four did the most damage. The city of LaCygne escaped a great deal of the fury of the storm, probably owing to the protection of the high hill north of town, but the country east of the city was almost laid waste for several miles. The remarkable feature of the storm is that no loss of life has been reported, except that of Engineer JONES, which occurred in a bad wreck one mile south of town as follows: A flat car loaded with ties, an empty box car and a cattle car were standing on the south end of the switch, near the stockyards and were put in motion by the wind. They passed safely from the sidetrack to the main line, down which they were forced at a terrific speed. About a mile south of town they met freight train No. 4! 0, pulled by engine No. 42, Engineer David JONES, and destroying the engine and several cars. The force of the collision was such that the flat car on which the ties were loaded was completely destroyed, the ties tearing their way through the engine and piling up on top of it. One of the ties went through the engineer's lookout window, pinning the engineer on his seat so he could not move, while another tie broke the steam pipes. The escaping steam scalded the engineer almost to death before he could be removed from the engine. The fireman, who escaped with slight injuries, and a tramp took the engineer out of the engine as soon as possible and brought him to town, where everything possible was done to relieve his suffering. He was taken to the company hospital in Kansas City Friday moring and died a short time after reaching there. Traffic on the road was delayed several hours, but by 7 o'clock Friday morning all trains were running as if nothing had happened. In the city the wind did considerable damage to buildings, sheds and shade and fruit trees, while the hail broke hundreds of window panes. Lightning struck in several places, but no serious damage is reported form this source. The large lumber shed on the south side of BLAKER's yard was blown down and the lumber considerably damaged by water. The awnings in front of the photograph gallery and the Miller Mercantile Co., building next to it were blown down. The steeple on the Presbyterian church was torn off and the main building damaged. All the window glass upstairs over Broadwell's drug store were broken out by hail and the drug stock badly damaged by the torrents of water that blew in at the broken windows. A window was blown in and the flue torn off of Henry GILLENWATER's house and almost all his household goods were ruined. Lightning struck the SINCLAIR house but the damage was slight. Hail broke dozens of window glass out of the house and great damage was done by the water which beat in. The large barn of Joesph BATES, norht of town was blown off the foundation. W.L. DABB's house in the southeast part of town was badly wrecked. W.A. HURLEY's large new barn in the Star valley neighborhood was completely destroyed.