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On September 17th 1922, a streetcar heading into the old Harvard Square trolley tunnel failed to stop and crashed into several other cars
in the station.
The Boston Globe had noted that the trolleys did not telescope into each other,
emphasizing the large force of the collision. Twenty-two people were
injured, with two seriously hurt.
A baseball game in North Cambridge had lined up the streetcars heading to
Harvard Square to connect with the Cambridge-Dorchester Subway trains
(today's Red Line). The trolleys were entering the tunnel from the incline at
Mount Auburn and Brattle Streets. A two-car trolley and a single car had
stopped to unload passengers, leaving enough space behind them for
another two-car trolley to unload. All of the trolleys were full of passengers.
According to the September 18th 1922 Boston Globe, a trolley "Came hurrying
down the incline. The car went plunging past the space, hit the single car
ahead into the trailer and car ahead of that, and there was some [people]
falling down among the strap-hangers, and much breaking of glass. The cars
did not telescope. The conductor of the single car was leaning against the
rear glass when the crash came, but somehow escaped unhurt."
A five year-old boy suffered a broken thigh, and a sixty-one year old women
received fractured ribs and internal injuries. Two ambulances took the injured
passengers to Cambridge Municipal Hospital. Thankfully, most passengers had
minor injuries such as cuts an bruises.
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