Photograph from The Queens Borough Public Library, Long Island Division, Frederick J. Weber Collection. For a view from the opposite perspective, click here. Because they were taken 17 years apart, some landmarks visible in this photograph will not appear in the linked one.

This 1950 daytime photograph shows the view the motorman of the Babylon train had as his train left the Kew Gardens Station area and emerged eastbound from under the Lefferts Boulevard overpass. The last car of the stalled Hempstead train was about 4 blocks distant - just short of the water tower to the left. Since the incident occurred at night, anything beyond the field of his train's headlights would not have been visible to the Babylon train's motorman. Within seconds of passing this point, the motorman suddenly realized there was another train stopped directly ahead and applied his emergency brakes. His shock at finding the Hempstead train stalled there was surely compounded by the certain realization that he would be dead within seconds. Click here to return to the main page.