Story
Fires, disasters & public safetyThe Fatal Explosion in a Trevorton Boxcar
March 28, 1909
A sleeping railway worker was killed on March 28, 1909; the newspaper’s theory about his attackers was not an established verdict.
Some details remain uncertainThree Reading Company section hands were sleeping in a boxcar on a siding outside Trevorton early on March 28, 1909, when an explosion tore through their shelter. The Mount Carmel Item identified the man killed as Salvatore Belofer. His two companions escaped with cuts and bruises.
The account described dynamite wrapped in clay and placed beneath Belofer’s bunk. It reported that the two survivors hurried toward town, where residents awakened by the blast had begun looking for its cause. At first, some feared a boiler explosion at the mines.
Coroner Clarence Malone of Shamokin and District Attorney A. K. Deibler took charge of the investigation. The paper reported a belief that the killing involved the Black Hand, but it did not identify the attackers or establish their membership in an organization.
The report said the three men had arrived the previous October to work on the railway. It also described Belofer as having no known quarrel. Those details make the unanswered question of who attacked the sleeping men more important than the alarming label attached to the crime.