"The Ballad of Casey Jones" was written about a real locomotive engineer, John Luther "Casey" Jones. He was already well known among Mississippi railroaders for various exploits before he died in the famous train crash of April 30, 1900.

The Wreck - Jones' final run occurred when he took over for a sick coworker, driving the llinois Central's "New Orleans Special" passenger train from Memphis toward Canton. Though Jones and his fireman Sim Webb left Memphis 95 minutes late, he was only five minutes behind as he approached Vaughan, Mississippi. Near Vaughan, Jones expected to pass a local train that was supposed to be on a siding, since the "New Orleans Special" had the right-of-way. But unknown to Jones that night, there were two trains on the siding, and their combined length was too long for the siding. Four freight cars and a caboose were right in Jones' path as he steamed around a curve.

After the accident, the railroad blamed Casey for ignoring warnings, including a flagman waving a lantern, and charges placed on the track which would have exploded, giving audible warning of the danger ahead. But Sim Webb refuted that story. He was in the locomotive, too, and he had seen no fireman or heard no charges. My take is that someone on the IC had "dropped the ball," and it was easier to blame the victim than whoever had really caused the accident. Or maybe there were insurance issues. Eventually the IC stopped making the claim, though I don't know if the original accident report was ever retracted.

The amazing thing is not that Casey died, or even that he died trying to stop the train, but that he slowed it down so much that none of his passengers were seriously injured, a remarkable feat of skill. Remember, this was before steel-framed coaches. Many train crashes in similar situations had resulted in the wooden coaches driving into each other like a collapsing telescope, killing or maiming everyone on the train.

Fortunately for the passengers, Casey was able to slow the train dramatically before it struck. In addition, the frames of the caboose and the first two freight cars (loaded with hay and corn respectively) were somewhat forgiving, further easing the effect of the impact. Unfortunately for Casey, the next car was loaded with lumber and far less forgiving. And when one of the largest locomotives of its day jumps the track, even at an estimated 35 mph, you don't walk away.

The Locomotive - Casey's favorite locomotive on the Illinois Central was a Consolidation (2-8-0), number 638. But the night he died, he was driving a coworker's favorite Ten-Wheeler (4-6-0), number 382. This is worth noting because the first printed version of the song calls Casey's locomotive a "six-eight wheeler." This phrase makes no sense to railroaders. It may have been a bowdlerized version of six-thirty-eight, Casey's favorite locomotive. But if you want the song to make sense to railroaders, you could sing "a big ten-wheeler." A few folks actually sing it that way. Well, maybe two.

The Song - Wallace Saunders, an African-American friend of Casey's who worked in the roundhouse, soon made up a song about the incident. Casey was neither the first nor the last locomotive engineer to go to "glory" pulling on the brakes, but Saunders' song put him on the path to another kind of glory.

Saunders' song got around and was apparently sung in several vaudeville shows. Eventually the vaudeville team of T. Lawrence Seibert and Eddie Newton published their version, which they billed as a comedy song. They "juiced up" the comedy aspect by adding a verse about Casey's widow telling her children not to mind Casey's death, because they have "another papa on the Salt Lake Line." Mrs. Jones refuted that rumor to her death, and most children's albums leave that verse off, but there you have it. In case you wondered, Saunders never received a penny for his efforts.

The popularity of "The Ballad of Casey Jones" is an anomaly among railroad songs - it didn't start out by becoming spreading through the working and disadvantaged classes, then gradually creeping into public attention with the rise of Folk, Country, or (in England) Skiffle music, say, sung by "Boxcar Willie," or the "Singing Brakeman," or Hudie "Leadbelly" Ledbetter. Rather it stormed the country's music halls, and was often as not performed by early 20th-century pop stars with an orchestra or an early jazz ensemble playing in the background. The old wax cylinder recording by Billy Murray shows a typical music hall treatment of the song.

The most often performed versions today resemble Seibert and Newton's version, although several folk singers, perhaps following a folk tradition observed by poet Carl Sandburg, tell the story to a modified tune with several verses "borrowed" from other, lesser-known railroad songs. Tom Rush's version is an example of that tradition.

On the other hand, the song has certain suffered from overexposure - it's been bowdlerized, satirized, rewritten and (some would say) butchered more than all other railroad songs put together.

On many of these pages, I provide a link to an Amazon search page that you can use to find other performances of the song, but in this case, it doesn't work out very well. Turns out that the song's popularity has caused a host of non-family-friendly offshoots, including a rock act with explicit lyrics as well as several rewrites of the song that involve drug smuggling, "scabbing" and other, er, non-railroading topics. In other words, a link to Amazon's Mp3 search page would not be family friendly. So on this page, I've tried to add the best or at least the most interesting versions I could find.

If you have a favorite version, or a favorite performer that I've left out, please contact me and I'll try to track them down. Also, if you don't see the link for a particular song, hit refresh - it seems like Amazon can never populate all of the links at the same time.

A Totally Different, but Great Song - Back about 1964, Randy Sparks wrote a whole new song to celebrate this hero. Recorded by the New Christy Minstrels, the arrangement sounds dated today, but it has a very catchy tune and clever lyrics.

Johnny Cash's Versions - One of the few mid-century singers who took the song seriously was Johnny Cash. When I first posted this page, I tracked down and listed several live performances that have never been available on any recording, and are never likely to be. But someone probably felt like they weren't getting enough money off those performances and forced YouTube to take them down.

The early studio version (not his best) was also taken down, but it has been restored..

One version I like was included in an old television special that was available on DVD for a while. Though out of print, used copies are available. The video suffered from budget constraints in its day and seems dated now, but for the true Johnny Cash collector, it might be worth checking out. (At the moment, it's also available on YouTube.)

Our Lyric Choices

For this version, I went back to some of the earliest, pre-vaudville versions to snag lines that told the actual story. Such as the other engineer calling in sick, Casey taking a locomotive he wasn't used to on a high speed run, and making up time as he went, and a freight train sitting where it wasn't supposed to be.

There's more to the story, of course, but at least it gets you a little closer to the version Wallace Saunders probably wrote in the first place, and it takes out the silly stuff like trying to reach San Francisco from Memphis in a single run.

Don't worry; if you don't like this version, you only have to google "Casey Jones Lyrics" to find hundreds to choose from.

Come all you rounders if you want to hear
The story of a brave engineer.
Casey Jones was the rounder's name.
On the Illinois Central, boys, he won his fame.

The caller called Casey at half past four.
The foreman met him at the roundhouse door;
He said "Joe Lewis can't make his run,
So you'll have to catch up on the Cannonball Run."

Chorus:
Casey Jones---climbed into the cabin,
Casey Jones---orders in his hand,
Casey Jones---lookin' out the window,
Taking a trip to the promis'd land.

They pulled out of Memphis two hours late,
They knew they'd driving at a terrible rate.
He called to the fireman, "Shovel your coal,
Stick your head out the window, see the drivers roll."

Through south Memphis yard on the fly,
Rain been falling and the water was high.
Everybody knew by the engine's moan
That the man at the throttle was Casey Jones.

Chorus:
Casey Jones---layin' on the throttle,
Casey Jones---whistle in his hand,
Casey Jones---lookin' out the window,
Taking a trip to the promis'd land.

On a high speed run on a rainy morn,
Down in Mississippi near the town of Vaughan,
Came the Cannonball Special only two minutes late
Eighty miles an hour when they saw a freight.

Caboose eighty-three was on the main line,
"Jump, Sim, while you have the time!"
Casey pulled the brake with the whistle in his hand,
Took his trip to the promised land.

Chorus:
Casey Jones---stayin' at the throttle,
Casey Jones---whistle in his hand,
Casey Jones---stayin' at the throttle,
Taking a trip to the promised land.

You-Tube Videos of This Song

• Johnny Cash Early Studio Version

• Johnny Cash Euro Concert Version

• Billy Murray & American Quartet a very early version, showing the "dance hall" or "vaudeville" approach that most early folks took.

• The Theme Song segment from the Casey Jones Television show - Starring Alan Hale - Gilligan's "Skipper" in the lead role.

• New Christy Minstrels' Version - a totally different song, but worth knowing about.

• Disney's Version - Watch it once before it gets pulled. Once is all you'll need.

Other Resources

• Lyric Sheet with Chords - This PDF has our lyric choices with the chords. If you can't sing in the key we chose, don't worry - the song only uses two chords, so you can easily transpose it to any other key.

• Seibert and Newton's original sheet music, It's three separate pages, so click on page 1, page 2, and page 3.