The railway span connecting Buffalo and Fort Erie is a bridge over troubled water. Big Ed Delahanty, the best baseball player of his era, plunged from it 120 years ago. His death remains the greatest mystery in local sports history.
Delahanty’s bio on the website of the National Baseball Hall of Fame says that his life “came to a tragic end when he exited a train and fell off the International Railway Bridge over Niagara Falls.” It’s a sentence that’s a swing and a miss.
The bridge is almost 20 miles from Niagara Falls. And we don’t know for sure that Delahanty fell from it. A night guard said he jumped. Others suspected that the guard pushed him off in a scuffle. His brothers believed he was the victim of a murder-robbery by several men.
And though it’s true that Delahanty “exited a train,” the fact is he was ushered off for egregious drunken behavior. We can forgive the baseball hall for its strikeout of a sentence. The events of that terrible night – it will be 120 years to the day on Sunday – remain uncertain all these years later.
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This much is sure: Big Ed Delahanty is the only man ever to win batting championships in both the National and American leagues. After switching from the NL to the AL, he was trying to switch back to the NL at the time he disappeared into the Niagara River.
Delahanty led the National League with a .408 average, for Philadelphia, in 1899, and led the American League with a .376 average, for Washington, in 1902. The Senators were playing in Detroit in 1903 when he booked a train to New York, where he apparently hoped to join the NL’s Giants.
He was 35 and had recently told a reporter: “I know I am getting along in years and won’t be able to last much longer in first-class baseball, therefore I am going to get all the money there is in sight.” He said he had made $3,000 a year in Philly, $4,000 in Washington, “and if I can get $5,000 no one can blame me for taking it.”
Michigan Central Train No. 6 left Detroit at 2:45 p.m. on Thursday, July 2, 1903. It was due to travel across Ontario, enter the U.S. at Buffalo, and arrive at Grand Central Terminal, in New York, on Friday morning. By the railroad’s account, Delahanty had five shots of whiskey, maybe more, while on board. His behavior then turned dangerous, the railroad said. He broke a glass case to grab a fire ax. He pulled a woman by her ankles from an upper sleeping berth. He chased passengers with a straight razor.
Conductor John Cole, with the help of other trainmen, put Delahanty off at what is now the Bridgeburg neighborhood of Fort Erie. Cole handed Delahanty his black derby, pointed him toward the small train station at 10:45 p.m., and told him not to misbehave because he was still in Canada. “I don’t care whether I’m in Canada or dead,” Delahanty said.
All this is according to the 1992 book “July 2, 1903: The Mysterious Death of Hall-of-Famer Big Ed Delahanty,” by Mike Sowell. So is the account of what happened next.
Sam Kingston, a rugged man in his 60s who was the bridge’s night guard, was startled when he saw a man on the span. The man was leaning against a pillar and staring at the river below, said Kingston, who flashed a lantern to get a better look. Then, by Kingston’s account, they exchanged words:
“Take that lantern away or I’ll break your face.”
“Have you permission to be on this bridge?”
“Keep away from me or I’ll brain you.”
They scuffled briefly. At some point Delahanty ended up in the river. Kingston didn’t report the incident until the next morning. Later that day, a bloated body was found below Niagara Falls near the Maid of the Mist boat landing. The only clothing left on the unidentified man was a necktie and black socks and black lace-up shoes. His face was unrecognizable.
Kingston told police that the man who went into the water had stepped off the open draw of the bridge. But the police determined that an automatic gate that went down when the draw went up would have prevented that. Kingston amended his story, settling on an insistence that Delahanty had jumped off the bridge. Police also found that Kingston had the black derby Delahanty had worn that night. Kingston said he must have picked it up by mistake after the scuffle.
Five Delahanty brothers played professional baseball. Frank, known as Pudgie, who played outfield in Syracuse, came to town to identify the body. The funeral was on July 11 in Cleveland, the family’s hometown. Red and white roses in the shape of a baseball bat covered the closed casket. Giants manager John McGraw was a pallbearer.
Police eventually called Delahanty’s death an accident. His brothers suspected foul play. In any case, they blamed the railroad conductor for forcing him off the train before it reached Buffalo, leaving him a bridge too far.
Delahanty’s widow sued the railroad. She asked for $20,000. The jury awarded her $3,000 and her daughter $2,000. Delahanty’s family had gotten the $5,000 he’d been hoping for, just not in the way anyone wanted.
It’s too bad that Ed Delahanty and Sam Kingston didn’t meet under other circumstances. They might well have become friends. Delahanty loved the horses; he lost money at racetracks across the country over the years. As it happens, Kingston lived in a house next door to Fort Erie Race Track. It was walking distance from his job.
The International Railway Bridge opened 150 years ago, in 1873, and is still in use. Its darkest day came 120 years ago.
Raise a toast Sunday, if you are so inclined, in memory of Big Ed. Canadian ale might be nice.
Please, though, no whiskey.