About the Researcher
My name is Dale Richard Hutchins. I was born in 1956 at Condell Hospital in Libertyville and have lived in or near Grayslake my entire life. I'm currently on Barron Boulevard, three-quarters of a mile from the Washington Street grade crossing.
By trade I'm an electrician. I hold a Class A Master Electrician's license in Illinois (No. IL-ME-04471-C, current as of 2008) and worked for 18 years at a commercial electrical contractor in Libertyville before starting my own business in 1994. I know how instruments work. I know what they're supposed to show.
I'm also a long-time history enthusiast. I've been a member of the Chicago History Museum, the Lake County Genealogical Society, and the Illinois State Historical Society since the early 1990s. When I found the Foote journal in 1998, I had enough background to understand what I was reading.
I started this research because I found something I couldn't explain and I needed to understand it. After ten years I still can't fully explain it. But I've documented enough to be certain that something is there, and that the official record (fourteen incidents, nine deaths, a 128-year pattern) should be taken seriously by someone with more resources than a Grayslake electrician working on his own.
Why I Built This Site
The original version of this site went up in October 2003, two weeks after the Metra NCS derailment that injured fourteen people. Before that, I had spent four years putting together a research binder and submitting it to everyone I could think of. Here's what happened:
- Lake County Historical Society: Thanked me for the Foote journal donation. Did not address the incident pattern.
- Metra Office of Safety: Form letter. No follow-up.
- Illinois Commerce Commission: No response.
- NTSB, written submission: No response.
- Grayslake Village Board, November 2002, in person: An alderman told me I was "wasting the board's time." I still have the notes from that meeting.
- Waukegan News-Sun: Editor said the story "did not meet their standards for publication." I have that letter too.
And then fourteen people got hurt on June 7, 2003, on the same stretch of track I had spent four years documenting.
The site has been up since 2003. I moved it to hauntedrails.com in 2006 and redesigned it in 2008. I've tried to make it less sensational and more straightforward over time. The facts are enough. I don't need to dress them up.
Contact / Submit a Sighting
I want to hear from you if:
- You have had a sighting or unusual experience at or near the Washington Street crossing or the Rollins Savanna marsh edge
- You are a researcher, journalist, or historian with relevant experience
- You have documents, photographs, or oral history relating to Bridget Connell, the Connell homestead, or early Avon Township history
- You are a current or former railroad employee with observations about this corridor
- You were a passenger on the Metra NCS train on June 7, 2003
- You have been in contact with anyone at the Metra safety office or NTSB about this corridor
Direct email: dhutchins@hauntedrails.com
I check this every day or two and respond to everyone who writes in good faith. If you're a reporter or researcher, say so in the subject line and I'll prioritize your message.
Sighting report form:
Recent Comments
"My grandmother grew up near the Washington Street crossing in the 1920s and always told us not to look at the tracks after dark. She never explained why. She was not a superstitious person in any other way. I never thought much about it until I found this site."
"You're not wrong about that section. There's a name the crews have for it. I can't say what it is here. Keep going."
"I was on that train in June 2003. I felt the cold air. I told my husband at the time that the AC must have broken. It wasn't the AC. I've been wanting to say that somewhere for three years."
"I do track inspection for Metra. That section is fine. They replaced the rail after 2003. There's nothing wrong with it."
[DHR: It's fine right now because they replaced it. It won't stay fine. -- D.H.]
"Dale you need a life man."
[DHR: Appreciate the feedback, Gary. -- D.H.]
A Final Word
I'm aware of how this looks. I've been called crazy more times in the last ten years than in the forty-seven before that. My ex-wife thinks this project is part of why we divorced. It's not, but it didn't help.
What I see on the Washington Street corridor is a pattern of failure that I can't account for through the records and evidence available to me. The rail gets replaced, the signals get inspected, the brakes get checked, and something else happens. It has been happening for 128 years. It may be coincidence. I've been trying to rule that out for ten years and I haven't managed it.
Bridget Connell was a real woman who was thrown off her land so a railroad could save a few miles of grade. Her husband's bones are somewhere in that corridor, under a century of ballast and rail. Whatever she did on that doorstep in August 1879, whatever she was saying to the ground. Foote's compass was already reading something anomalous on that same stretch of earth the year before. It was there before the railroad. It was there before her.
I don't know what that means. I just think someone should be paying attention to it.
-- Dale R. Hutchins, Grayslake, October 2008