Life History

Other facts

Notes

• Olaf Frederick Jensen
  14 APR 1885 - 14 JUL 1983
  BIRTH: 14 APR 1885, Americus, KS
  DEATH: 14 JUL 1983, Council Bluffs, IA
  Father: Jensen
  Spouse: Amanda Katherine Wilson
  Children:
  Ferne Virginia Jensen
  Russell Soren Jensen
  Jeanette Louise Jensen
  Earl Wilson Jensen
  --  Carrigan Genealogy, http://www.carriganlane.com/w_dir/d0000/g0000016.html#I1231
  
  ---------------------------------------------------
  Alan Kent Boucher, 18 Jan 2010
  
  This  story was told by Dick Wilson through his online magazine called The Brass Switchkey
  
  Jim L. Rueber's story of the CNW engineer with a 6th sense triggered a story that my uncle, Olaf Jensen, told me back in the 1960's. I'm not sure of the exact date and it the event may have occurred in the 1940's.
  
  Uncle Olaf had plenty of seniority as an engineman on the Rock Island and worked the Rock Island Rocket out of Council Bluffs to Des Moines. The trackage was single track mainline and on this particular day they were headed eastward out of Atlantic, Iowa.  He knew that there was a westbound freight ahead but the signal system was down and the crew was not sure where the freight might be.  So, communicating with the conductor, Olaf insisted that they back into a siding near Anita.  The conductor agreed and just shortly after backing into the siding, the westbound freight came chugging around the bend.
  
  Thus, a possible cornfield meet had been avoided. A 6th sense ... maybe there is something that engineers possessed after years on the job.   Olaf worked the Council Bluffs yard in the early 1900's, eventually handled road service, then held down the Oakland branch job around WW2, and afterwards followed the passenger run.  He retired after over 50 years of service around 1954 and passed away at age 99.  He kept a complete diary of his early engineman days and was responsible for the Rock Island Adair, Iowa, memorial to the engineer that was killed during the Jesse James' gang robbery.  Olaf was an amateur inventor and family members said he had a patent on a railroad crossing device that he developed.
  --  Alan Kent Boucher, http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/14201731/story/7fbac028-f3dc-46c9-8d83-b4789b7af1ef
  ---------------------------------------------------
  

Sources

• 1. 1925 Iowa State Census, Pottawattamie County
  • Council Bluffs Ward 5, page 403, 927 6th Avenue
• 2. Carrigan Genealogy
• 3. 1910 Federal Census, Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma
  • 18 April, Council Bluffs Ward 4, District 140, page 5B, 1701 So 9th St, Hse #102, Fam #103
• 4. Ancestry Trees
  • Julie Ann Ryan, http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/16486092/person/433720088
• 5. Find a Grave Memorial Registry