In Memorium: William Huskinson, M.P.

I hate to admit it but Marcel Proust was probably right. Even people who know history tend to repeat the same idiotic mistakes their grandfathers made, who were, of course, repeating their grandfather’s mistakes - Etc. ad naseum. As proof of this dismaying lack of a learning curve in humans I give you the noble sacrifice of the Right Honorable William Huskisson, Minister of Parliament. If Christ died for our sins, then William Huskisson died to prove that the human species are morons.
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On September 15, 1830, the first steam powered passenger rail line opened between Manchester and Liverpool, England. Riding in the inaugural train from Liverpool was Mr. Huskisson, stewing over a political beef he had with the then Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington. (Get it? Stewing over Beef Wellington?) When the train stopped at Parksdale station, 17 miles outside of Liverpool, to take on water, Huskisson disembarked, the better to harass the Duke, who was riding in the last car of the same train. As he reached through that car’s window to shake the reluctant Dukes’ shoulder the inaugural train out of Manchester roared through the station at the unheard of speed of 25 miles per hour. Mr. Huskisson froze in a panic. The Duke tried to pull Huskisson into his car but the westbound train was faster. It crushed Huskisson’s foot and pulled his leg under the wheels and further mangled it. His death later that night in great agony made headlines across England - Train Kills Man. And William Huskisson was the first.
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In the 175 years since it has become a given that to be killed by a train you have to be an idiot. I mean, it’s not as if trains swerved and hit people at random. Pretty much you have to be on the train tracks to be hit by a train. See tracks, look for train. See train, get off tracks. But according to the Department of Transportation some 2,027 stupid people in this country were killed by trains in 2003 – the most recent year for which numbers are available.
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But are people stupider for being hit by trains, or are the rest of us stupider for not noticing the consistency with which people avoid crossing guards and ignore flashing warning lights or who look but don’t see a huge locomotive barreling down upon them? Could it not be that perhaps having several thousand tons of steel, which may take a mile to stop, rushing through our neighborhoods “at grade” for the last 170 years constituted a fundamental design flaw? Perhaps being hit by a train is never entirely the victim’s fault. After all, just how smart are the engineers who don’t design for human stupidity?
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I bring all this up at this particular moment because the geniuses who operate the lovely Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco have finally decided to consider some designs for a suicide barrier on their lovely bridge. The idea is put something between the potential suicide and the empty space hundreds of feet above the cold ocean water besides a simple waist high railing.
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Since the lovely Golden Gate opened on May 27th, 1937, an average of 20 people a year have jumped from the lovely span. That makes around 1, 369 people who were so stupid they thought suicide was romantic, and didn’t connect a graceful swan dive with hitting the cold water at something over 100 miles per hour. At that speed water behaves like concrete and if you haven’t seen a jumper who has hit concrete I have, and I highly recommend you avoid seeing one or being one.
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But is committing suicide anywhere near as stupid as the fact that there was no serious proposal for a barrier on the pedestrian walkway until the 1970’s, after some 600 people had already clambered over the railing? Of course, once the idea was suggested the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, which operates the bridge, and the citizens of San Francisco who own it, they all slapped themselves in their collective foreheads and said, “Well, duh!” Unfortunately, they did not.
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The idea was rejected. And rejected again in 1998. And the arguments against a barrier were just….well, stupid. Said the opponents, “If people can’t jump off this bridge, they’ll just jump off some other bridge”. That may be true but so what? Do we NOT put STOP signs at an intersection because if people don’t collide here, they’ll just crash at some other intersection?
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“Why should everybody pay for a barrier to save the lives of a small minority?” You know, that it may be the most un-Christian and immoral question I’ve ever heard asked. To even ask that question is to be willfully stupid. And yet it remains an argument made by members of the MT.C, who agreed to a barrier to prevent pedestrians and bicyclists from falling onto the roadway, but remain opposed to one to prevent people from jumping in the bay. Stupid.
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So why did stupid San Francisco suddenly get smart? Recently a filmmaker announced he was about to release the ultimate snuff film staring the lovely Golden Gate Bridge. Over the past three years he had inadvertently captured on film 19 suicides. When his film is released the public image of the lovely bridge wouldn’t be so lovely anymore.
Suddenly the M.T. C. found $1.6 million to study a suicide barrier. It’s not enough to complete the study. Certainly it’s not enough to build a barrier. But it’s a start.
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Screw you, Marcel. And, Mr. Huskisson? Perhaps your death had meaning, after all.
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