DISASTER: The Last Shipment

South Amboy, N.J. (pop. 9,500), a minor port on the southern arm of vast New York Harbor, is the kind of nondescript town through which most travelers pass on the way to somewhere else. Manhattan vacationists zip past on the way to seaside villages and resorts. Commuters on the Pennsylvania's gritty Jersey Shore line spend five minutes there every trip, buried in their newspapers or staring glumly at a shabby luncheonette across from a tavern while the electric engine is changed for a steam locomotive. Sprawled along the estuary of the Raritan...

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