Near this site, an iron truss bridge collapsed into the Ashtabula River during a blizzard, plunging a passenger train with 160 on board into the gulf below. Nearly 100 people were killed in one of the worst train disasters in American history. Among the best known passengers were Philip Paul Bliss and his wife, Lucy; Bliss was a leading gospel songwriter who wrote more than 100 hymns, including the music to "It Is Well With My Soul." The unidentified dead were buried in a mass grave at Chestnut Grove Cemetery. The disaster also led to the founding of the local hospital and to reforms in bridge design and railroad safety.