March 20, 2026 
by M. Regina Cram
It was the Roaring Twenties, and life was full of promise for John Griffith. He dreamed of visiting faraway lands with exotic names, far from his Midwestern home.
His dream was interrupted by the Great Depression. Millions of Americans, including Griffith, headed east in search of work.
Griffith found a job in Missouri, controlling a huge railroad bridge that spanned the Mississippi River. Day after day, he sat in the control room, working the enormous gears that raised the bridge, allowing barges and ships to pass below. Each passing vessel was a bitter reminder of his lost dreams.
One day, Griffith brought his 8-year-old son, Greg, to work with him. Greg delighted in the enormous cogs in the gearbox. He thought his father must be the most powerful man in the world to control such a bridge.
The morning passed quickly. At noon, Griffith elevated the bridge to allow scheduled ships to pass. He and his son were free until 1 p.m., when the bridge had to be lowered for the Memphis Express passenger train to cross.
They grabbed their lunch sacks, edged across the catwalk, and settled onto the observation deck jutting over the Mississippi. There, they watched great passing ships, imagining where they might be headed.
Griffith was jerked out of his reverie by the shrill whistle of a train. He was alarmed to see it was 1:07 – scarcely enough time to race to the control room and lower the bridge.
Instructing his son to stay in place, Griffith climbed the steel ladder to the control room and glanced underneath for obstacles. To his horror, he saw that his son had slipped off the catwalk into the gearbox. His leg was jammed between two giant cogs and was bleeding profusely. He couldn’t break free.
Griffith wanted to run to the gearbox with a rope, pull his son to safety, then return to the control room to lower the bridge for the oncoming train.
But he knew his desperate plan was hopeless. The train was bearing down at tremendous speed, and his son was too far below to be reached in time. Griffith was faced with an impossible choice: save his son and watch 400 train passengers hurl to their deaths, or lower the drawbridge so the train could cross, but crush his son’s small body.
The decision was excruciating, but he knew what he must do. Griffith buried his face in his arm and pressed down hard on the lever. The grinding of the bridge drowned his son’s cries. Seconds later, the Memphis Express thundered across the bridge, its occupants unaware that their lives had been secured at the cost of a man’s only son.
John Griffith looked through the windows of the train as it sped past. He wanted to scream, “What’s the matter with you people? Don’t you know I sacrificed my son for you?”
But no one noticed, and the train disappeared down the track.
This true story is an echo of Jesus’ sacrifice for us.
M. Regina Cram is a published author and a parishioner of SS. Isidore and Maria Parish.
