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FRIDAY 2/9/07 ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS NEWS 29
THE CROSSING By Kevin Vaughann Photos by Chris Schneidern Rocky Mountain News
CHAPTER 16: DRIVER’S SEAT
Glen Ford never expected it wouldturn out this way.His cowboy hands grip the steeringwheel of a school bus, 45 yearsafter he survived a school bus-traincollision that killed his older brother.
Helogs160 milesa day.He cross-es railroadtracks29 times.
On this morning, he is in thedriver’s seat in the darkness, hisfaceilluminatedonlybytheinstru-ments on the dashboard, the die-sel engine grumbling beneathhim.
The digital clock beside thegaugesglowsred: 6:49 a.m.
He’sgot plentyof time.He has a good 10 minutesbefore
he needs to get going on his morn-ing route for the Platte ValleySchoolDistrict.
It will take him across the farmfieldsaroundKersey,thoughGree-ley and Milliken and Johnstownand back.
The heater whirs. The defrosterhums.
Every few seconds, the wipersslide back and forth with awhump.
It’s a typical morning. Just asDec. 14, 1961, was a typical morn-ing.
Glen, 56, warms up his bus. Justas Duane Harms got up early towarm up his bus on that fatefulmorning four and a half decadesago.
Railroad crossings await him.Just as they awaited DuaneHarms.
‘A piece of cake’In 1980, Glen Ford and his wife,
Jane, bought a 35-acre slice of thefarm he and his brothershad livedon as boys.
Many of the families he hadknownas a kid had movedon. TheBrantners had sold their 320-acrefarm. The Paxtons were long gonefromtheirplaceacrosstheroad.
A few remained. The Walsos.The Alles families.
The area still looked much as ithad. A few of the old houses withclapboardsiding had been movedor torn down. Newer brick homesstoodin theirplace.
The home where Glen and hisbrothers romped as boys wasgone,replacedby a largerhouse.
But on a clear day, Longs Peak
still loomed majestically to thewest. Pinto beans, corn, sugarbeets and alfalfa still sprouted inthewide-openfields.
In the Ford home, cowboyingwas a way of life. Glen made agood living on the rodeocircuitfortwo decades, riding bareback,climbing onto bone-snappingbullswhenhe neededextracash.
His brother Bruce was evenmore successful, winning theworld bareback-riding title fivetimes, becoming a legend in theprocess.
Rodeo still courses through thefamily’sveins.
Glen’s oldest son, 29-year-oldHeath, is a top bareback rider,and 26-year-old Jarrod is a topbullrider.
And Bruce’s son, 25-year-oldRoyce, has flirted with the verytopof the barebackworld.
Even Nic, Glen’s youngest sonat age 23, is on therodeocircuit,atthewheelof a Dodgepickup,shut-tling Jarrod from rodeo to rodeo,makingtravelarrangements.
It’s the life Bruce and Glen livedfor decades.
But in 1984, Glen could see theday coming when he would nolongercompete.
One day, Jane called him athome.
The Kersey school district,whereshewasa teach-er, needed a schoolbusdriver.
Almost on impulse,Glen drove to the ad-ministrative officeand filled out the
paperwork. He figured it mighthelppay the lightbill for a while.
More than 22 years later, he isstillat it.
The work is easy in many ways— “a pieceof cake”he calls it.
But there’sone hazard that’sonhis mind every day: railroadcross-ings. He thinks about them evenwhen he’s not on the job. Some-times, early in the morning, whenhe’s lying in bed, a train whistlewill blaresomewhereoff in thedis-tance.
The tracks pass by just a halfmile away from his home on thefarm wherehe grewup.
Those tracks are seldom usedthese days; the Union Pacific end-ed passengertrain service on May1, 1971.
But each time he hears thatwhistle,he thinksthesame thing.
“You better be looking for him,becauseyou neverknow whenthattrain’sgoing to be comingthrough,still,”hesays.
“It isn’t going as fast as it usedto, but it doesn’t have to be goingfastto hit you.”
Morning roundsIt’snow 7 a.m. The busis warm.The odometer shows a tick
more than 181,000 miles, almostall of themGlen’s.
He reaches for the shift lever infront of him and slides the trans-mission into reverse, backs up,moves it into drive, then acceler-ates slowly out of the fenced yardwherethebusesare kept.
“Don’t get seasick now,” hesays, and smiles as the cumber-some bus rocks back and forth. Afew minutes later, he is at his firstrailroad crossing, on the edge ofKersey.
The rails in front of him carriedthe Union Pacific train thatsmashed into his bus more than45 years ago.
He goes through a ritual he willrepeatmany timesthis day.
Slide open the window to hisleft. Push open the door to hisright. Look one way, then the oth-er.
Convincedit’s clear, he steps onthe gas pedal, and the bus jostlesacross the tracks and starts up ahill.
He heads down a long, straight,narrow county road, turns off the
pavement onto another long,straight, narrow county road. Thebus jiggles over the washboardsurface.
As he drives,he talks abouthowmuch he likes the work, how littleeffortit requires.
“It’s about like getting up anddriving to the coffee shop is whatit amounts to,” he says. “And theypay you for it.”
These days his route takes himto the homes of youngsters withspecialneeds.
He wheels into the yard of afarm home,drivesaroundthe lanethat goes behind the home andstopsnear the frontdoor.
A little girl comes out. Glenopens the door and gets out of hisseat.
“Good morning, Maria,” hesays.
The little girl climbs up thestepsand heads to the back of thebus.
His route takes him backthroughtown.
“Good morning,” he says as an-other girl gets on the bus. Hewaves to the girl’s father, whostands in the doorway of hishome.
Fartheralong,he pullsup a longlaneto a driveway,backsup, turnsaround and stops in front of a bigbrick home. He gives the horn ablast, and a boy comes out, getson.
“What’shappening?”Glenasks.He pulls away. The children sit
in silenceas he steersthebusbackontoa countyroad.
“I’m sure they’re a little morequiet than Duane’s were, becauseI was one of them. It was no piece
of cake for him,”he says.After a stop in Greeley, he
headssouth.Near Milliken, he approaches a
crossing where the tracks are atan angle.He pullsup, stops,opensthe door and window. It’s easy toseeto his left.
But he has to twist in his seatandlookback,overhis rightshoul-der, to seethe tracksto theright.
That’s how it was that morningin 1961 at a different crossing inWeldCounty.
Duane Harms never saw thetrain that slammed into his bus,pummeling 11-year-old Glen, in-juring his 9-year-old brother,Bruce, and killing his 13-year-oldbrother,Jimmy.
On this day, this crossing isclear.
‘Nothing he could do’At each crossing, Glen thinks
aboutDec.14, 1961.Each time he goes by the spot
wherethat accidenthappened,hethinks about it. The site is lessthan 11/2 miles from his home, andhe passes it four times on somedays.
All those thoughts, and allthose years at the wheel of a bus,have given Glen Ford a perspec-tive on Duane Harms that per-haps no one elsehas.
“That guy was a good guy,” hesays. “As far as I’m concerned, hedidn’t make no mistake. Anybodywould have made that one. Therewas nothinghe coulddo for it.”
A numberof factorsaddedup totragedy,he says.
A bad crossing.
Frostedbus windows.Haze in theair.A latetrain.Utility poles that obscured the
view.“I felt that way from the day af-
ter the wreck,” he says. “I neverdid hold it against Duane. Someof the parents wanted to crucifythe guy. It would have happenedto them if they would have beendrivingthatday.”
Then Glen offers a startling as-sessment.
“That guy loved them kids,” hesays. “I mean, he went through alot of torture knowing that kidswerekilled.He lovedthemall.
“He’s a better bus driver thanme. Sometimes, I don’t love themall.”
SATURDAY: AliveBruce Ford
COURTESY LORETTA FORD
Hearty boys: Bruce and GlenFord pose on their horses withthe new saddles they got forChristmas after the bus crash.
Aboutthis series
In just seconds, 20 childrendied, and a community wasdevastated.
At 7:59 a.m. on Dec. 14, 1961, ahigh-speed passenger trainsmashed into a school buscarrying 36 students in the farmcountry of Weld County. It wasthe worst traffic accident inColorado history. Only 16children and the bus driversurvived.
We cannot know how today’stragedies — Columbine,Oklahoma City, Sept. 11 — willripple over a lifetime.
But 45 years after that bittermorning outside Greeley, wecan see — if not fully understand— how a single moment has thepower to uncoil throughdecades, shaping people for therest of their lives.
Onlineat RockyMountainNews.com
n Video: Glen Ford drives hisbus route through rural WeldCounty.n Slide show: More Glen Fordphotos.n Discuss: Share your thoughtson the series and read others’comments at RockyTalk Live.n Sources: Read an annotatedversion of the story with sourcesof information listed.n Earlier chapters: See previousinstallments in the 33-partseries.
n Contact reporterKevin Vaughan:[email protected] or 303-954-5019n Contact photographerChris Schneider:[email protected] or 303-954-2270
n Public forum at 7 p.m. Feb. 21in Greeley: Reporter KevinVaughan, photographer ChrisSchneider, multi-mediaproducer Tim Skillern andprojects editor Carol Hanner willdiscuss the Crossing series atthe Union Colony Civic Center,701 10th Ave., Greeley.
The event, sponsored by theCity of Greeley Museums, is free,but advanced tickets can bepicked up at the Civic Center boxoffice. Tickets at the dooravailable at 6 p.m. Feb. 21;theater opens at 6:30 p.m.n Information: 1- 970-350-9220,1-970-356-5000 or1-800-315-2787.
On his mind: Glen Forddrives a school bus on hisrural route south of Kersey inWeld County. A survivor ofthe 1961 crash that injured oneof his brothers and killedanother, he began driving aschool bus in 1984. Theaccident is a constantpresence. “I think about itevery day — every time I pullup on the railroad tracks,” hesays.
Glen Ford Jimmy Ford
28 NEWS ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS FRIDAY 2/9/07
