Dictionary

cornfield meet en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (General-American) audio
• /ˈkɔːnfiːld ˌmiːt/ (Received-Pronunciation)
• (Australia) audio
• /ˈkɔɹnˌfild ˌmit/ (General-American)
• (Received-Pronunciation) audio

Etymology

Either from the fact that early train collisions often occurred out in the country alongside a cornfield rather than in a station or siding; or from staged events where two old steam locomotives were purposely run head on at each other, often in an open field, for public entertainment. In the latter idea, the term may jocularly echo field meet as a spectacle in the field involving opposing contestants.

Meanings

1. (US, euphemistic) An accidental head-on collision or near head-on collision of two trains.
   • One hundred years ago, staged railroad accidents were popular events. […] "Head-on Joe" Connolly made a business out of "cornfield meets" holding seventy-three events in thirty-six years. 1998, Ian Savage, “Preface”, in The Economics of Railroad Safety (Transportation Research, Economics and Policy; 7), New York, N.Y.: Springer Science+Business Media, →ISBN, page xi:
   • [An 1899 man discovering ragtime:] [N]ow they're writing music that sounds like a cornfield meet. 2007, Eddie Campbell, The Black Diamond Detective Agency: Containing Mayhem, Mystery, Romance, Mine shafts, Bullets, New York, N.Y.; London: First Second Books, →ISBN, page 137:
   • Do you think it's possible for two trains to have a cornfield meet right in the middle of an automatically protected block? Of course it is, if one of the hoggers is drunk or asleep at the throttle […] 1943, Railroad Magazine, volume 34, New York, N.Y.: Frank A[ndrew] Munsey Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 100, column 1:
   • [A] couple of passenger trains staged a cornfield meet in the deep cut on Mount Holly, which the road settled with "gratuities" amounting to $50,000. By this time the Rutland had built up enough financial stability to weather these incidents with a minimum of distress. 1997, Jim Shaughnessy, “The Hunted Traps the Hunter”, in The Rutland Road, 2nd edition, Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, →ISBN, page 26:
   • One such instance when a conductor failed to follow a prescribed timetable resulted in a head-on smashup on the Long Island Railroad at the end of the Civil War. On August 28, 1865, General Grant and General Sherman collided in a pasture at Jamaica, New York. Five passengers were killed in this cornfield meet. 1968, Robert C[arroll] Reed, “Head-on Collisions”, in Train Wrecks: A Pictorial History of Accidents on the Main Line, New York, N.Y.: Bonanza Books, Crown Publishing Group, →OCLC, page 55:

Forms

Relateds

train wreck

Synonyms

prairie meet (collision) · Mexican standoff (near-collision)