issued by the United States Postal Service.]]John Luther "Casey" Jones (March 14, 1863 – April 30, 1900) was an American railroad engineer from Jackson, Tennessee who worked for the Illinois Central Railroad (IC). In 1900 he alone was killed when his passenger train collided with a stopped freight train at Vaughan, Mississippi on a foggy and rainy night. His dramatic death trying to stop his train and save lives made him a railroad icon who became immortalized in a popular ballad sung by his friend Wallace Saunders, an African American engine wiper for the IC. Due to the powerful cultural resonance of the song, he has been the world's most famous railroad engineer for over a century. Youth and career John Luther "Casey" Jones was born March 14, 1863 in southeast Missouri to country school teacher Frank Jones and his wife Anne. His exact place of birth is unknown. He was the first of five children. In 1876 his fam