WILMINGTON – In 1877, a railway signalman in Cape Town South Africa named James “Jumper” Wide once again attempted to uphold his reputation as a boxcar jumper by leaping between two moving rail cars.
He didn’t exactly stick the landing.
Wide survived the nearly 10-foot free fall to the tracks below, but was caught underneath the moving train and both of his legs were severed at the knees.
Thereafter confined to a handmade wagon for movement, he was unable to move around the rail-yard efficiently and had to figure out a way to keep his job with the Cape Town Port Elizabeth Railway Service.
He needed an assistant.
One day, while rolling through the shops at the town market, Wide spotted a young local named Jack who was pulling an ox-wagon down the street by a lead rope.
Looking down at his own trolley, Wide realized that he, too, could use a tow.
Wide approached Jack and the merchant he worked for and offered to buy him out, so that Jack could come work for him at the rail-yard.
Jack’s boss agreed but cautioned Wide that Jack was … different.
Standing only four and half feet tall, Jack was exceptionally strong for his size, but he had the intelligence of a 3-year-old and was unable to speak.
He communicated with basic grunts and hand gestures and needed constant supervision and care.
The merchant advised Wide that Jack could be trained to perform simple tasks but due to his mental limitations, James shouldn’t expect much more out of him.
Jack began to work with Wide by simply pulling Wide’s wagon back and forth from home (which they now shared) to the rail-yard itself.
But Jack was naturally curious about Wide and his tasks, and Wide quickly realized that Jack was capable of much more than just pushing and pulling a wagon.
One of Wide’s responsibilities that had become most difficult after the loss of his legs was the picking up and delivering of coal shed keys for the various train conductors that came through the yard.
When the conductor needed coal for their train, they would signal to Wide by blowing their whistle four times.
It was extremely difficult for Wide to hobble off his platform at the signal box station, grab the coal box key, and deliver it to the train conductor across the yard.
Jack had been watching Wide closely throughout these tasks and, in true “monkey see, monkey do” fashion, began to imitate Wide and follow him around the rail-yard.
On one of these occasions, Jack, sensing Wide’s frustrations, took the key from Wide and delivered it to the proper train conductor himself.
Jack then began to listen for and react to the various whistles of the train conductors and even learned to operate the levers at the signal box that controlled different sections of the tracks.
The odd paring of double amputee Wide and the short-statured, simple-minded Jack running around the rail-yard was enough of a novel sight that the two eventually became somewhat of a tourist attraction.
While many people came to marvel at the two working on the job, not everyone was thrilled with this peculiar arrangement.
A worried citizen contacted the upper management of the railroad and complained that they were uncomfortable with Jack being responsible for the signal changes at the rail-yard (which prevented trains from running head on into each other) and did not totally trust his judgment.
This threw a monkey wrench into the two’s positions with the company.
While Wide using an assistant was well-known to upper management, it was not apparent to them that Jack was not of normal mental capacity.
A manager and other staff members visited the station and threatened to fire both Wide and Jack due to the safety concerns of the public.
Not wanting to give up on Jack, Wide challenged the system manager to test Jack’s ability to run the signal box.
The manager agreed and told a train engineer to run through various signal-indicating whistles.
The engineer even used less common and more complicated whistle requests as a test, but Jack made all the changes without fail, and kept his eyes on the engineer’s train the whole time.
The system manager was satisfied with Jack’s performance and allowed Wide and Jack to keep their positions in the rail-yard.
Jack would go on to work for the rail-yard for another 9 years.
During his tenure, it is said that he never once made a mistake on the job and never got distracted by any monkey business.
Which was impressive, considering that Jack was a baboon.
