This is one of the coolest folklore items of all time. I grew up in Herkimer NY (April 26, 7:50 pm) and us kids practically raised ourselves on those
tracks. As a kid, I had heard of the Lincoln Ghost Train, but never knew that the real train had glided by our town on the very tracks I grew up on. I
never thought it would've gone as far north in its journey to Illinois.
Very eerie place, those tracks. I do remember a completely silent train (much more modern looking, though) slip by the bunch of us as we were walking
(it was the late spring of 1973) from our access bridge (situated next to Johnny Glogowski's backyard) to the "train bridge" (a swimming hole/party
spot on the W. Canada Creek) and being surprised that I couldn't hear it but I could hear our sneakers crunching on the gravel as we walked. Years
later, (summer of 1998) I was helping a friend move (she was there on the tracks walking with us on that night) and she asked me
"do you remember
the silent train?" - that exact question, and no other explanation about the question. Of course I remembered it. I was floored because I'd
brought that incident up to my brother, and one of the other guys some months after the incident had happened, and they'd thought I was nuts. They
hadn't seen anything. I never talked about it except for those two instances (my brother and Johnny Glog) again. Definitely never to her.
The oddest thing was that she didn't feel the need to recall to me the story about it, as you'd expect if two close friends hadn't ever spoken about
the incident or could've ever even known that the other had also experienced it, which was the case. She simply brought it up out of the blue and
expected me to understand exactly what she was referring to - which I did immediately. We'd never admitted to each other that we'd both seen it. And
when I say we saw it, we were (at most) ten feet from the tracks that the train was on, and it just suddenly showed up and bathed everything in its
powerful headlight as it slipped slowly, silently by and then I actually don't remember an entire train of boxcars behind the engine, but that was
pretty common to see too. An engine arrangement with no boxcars behind it, making its way from here to there.
So, I know that I did see this train, and I know that it was completely silent. Real trains are loud as hell, and none of us would've been ignoring a
train as it went by only ten feet away from us. They're pretty deafening up close like that.
I know it wasn't the Lincoln Ghost Train, but it was something unusual. Makes you wonder about Residual Information and what makes it visually
manifest like that at times, and to only a select number of people within a given location.
edit on 2/3/2014 by NorEaster because: (no reason given)