Old Circus Wagon Helps Honor Century-Old Train Crash Victims

PERU, Ind. (AP) -- An old circus wagon built and housed in northern Indiana has been featured in an Illinois ceremony for a century-old train crash that killed 86 performers.

The Kokomo Tribune reports the Sig Sautelle bandwagon was used in the Thursday memorial in Forest Park, Illinois. Attendees gathered at the cemetery where victims were buried to mark the 1918 crash that also injured more than 100 people with the Hagenbeck-Wallace circus.

The bandwagon is housed at the International Circus Hall of Fame outside Peru, Indiana, the city where it was built. Peru also had been the headquarters for the circus, once the United States' second largest.

Circus Historical Society member Bob Cline, who helped load the wagon Wednesday for its trip, says it was appropriate for it to be part of the ceremony.

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