West, Texas - Notable Events

Notable Events

  • West is the location for Westfest, a festival celebrating the city's large Czech population and their heritage. There are several bakeries (such as the Czech Stop and Little Czech Bakery) and a hotel nearby called The Czech Inn.
  • Crush, Texas was located just three miles (5 km) south of West and location of The Crash at Crush, a head-on collision between two locomotives that was staged on Sept. 15, 1896, as a publicity stunt for the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad. Over 30,000 spectators gathered at the crash site, named "crush" for MKT passenger agent William Crush, who conceived the idea. About 4 p.m. the trains were sent speeding toward each other. Contrary to mechanics' predictions, the steam boilers exploded on impact, propelling pieces of metal into the crowd. Two people were killed and many others injured, including Jarvis Deane of Waco, who was photographing the event. Texas Historical Marker 5315, located on Interstate 35 northbound frontage road, between Mangrum and Wiggins Road, commemorates the event.

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