The Wreck of the Old 97 was an American rail disaster involving the Southern Railway mail train, officially known as the Fast Mail (train number 97), while en route from Monroe, Virginia, to Spencer, North Carolina, on September 27, 1903. Travelling at an excessive speed in an attempt to maintain schedule, the train derailed at the Stillhouse Trestle near Danville, Virginia, where it careened off the side of the bridge, killing 11 on-board personnel and injuring seven others. The wreck inspired a famous railroad ballad, which was the focus of a copyright lawsuit and became seminal in the genre of country music. Wreck The wreck of Old 97, known as the Fast Mail, occurred when the engineer, 33-year-old Joseph A. ("Steve") Broady at the controls of Southern Railway 1102, was operating the train at high speed in order to stay on schedule and arrive at Spencer on time. The Fast Mail had a reputation for never being late. Locomotive 1102, a ten-wheeler 4-6-0 engine built by Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, had rolled out of the factory in early 1903, less than a year before the wreck. On the day of the accident, the Fast Mail was behind schedule when it left Washington, D.C., and was one hour late when it arrived in Monroe, Virginia. When the train arrived in Monroe its crew was switched, and when it left Monroe, there were 17 people on board. The train personnel included Broady, conductor John Blair, fireman A.C. Clapp, student fireman John Hodge (sometimes known as Dodge in other documents), and flagman James Robert Moody. Also aboard were various mail clerks including J.L. Thompson, Scott Chambers, Daniel Flory, Paul Argenbright, Lewis Spies, Frank Brooks, Percival Indermauer, Charles Reams, Jennings Dunlap, Napoleon Maupin, J. H. Thompson, and W. R. Pinckney, an express messenger. When the train pulled into Lynchburg, Wentworth Armistead, a safe locker, boarded the train, bringing the number of on-board personnel to 18. (A safe locker is a railroad employee entrusted with the combination to a train's safe.) At Monroe, Broady was instructed to get the Fast Mail to Spencer, distant, on time. The scheduled running time from Monroe to Spencer was four hours, fifteen minutes – an average speed of approximately . In order to make up the one hour delay, the train's average speed would have to be at least . Broady was ordered to maintain speed through Franklin