The Great Moveway Jam
For months they waited to be rescued from the mammoth traffic jam. Then the ’copters came!
By John Keefauver
Published in Omni magazine, March 1979
Editor’s note: The majority of readers will remember, of course, the Great Fourteen-Month Moveway Jam near Moveway City, California, during 1998-99, which, at the time, was the longest and largest traffic jam in the history of mankind. But what most readers do not know is that if it were not for an unassuming, prim, and frightened little man – Henry Littlefinger – the world today would not now have the opportunity to learn of at least part of the terror of Jam-ees who were inside that prairie of unMoving automobiles on an unMoving Moveway in a jam that extended from San Diego to Santa Barbara, and from the Pacific Ocean eastward to points reaching some seventy-nine miles inland. Carefully, patiently, calmly, Jam-ee Littlefinger for more than a year jotted into an ever-thickening notebook the incidents that went on around him in Jamland. The world should well be thankful that he, as a stationery salesman, had in his Jammed-in blue panel truck an ample supply of paper, pens, and ink that fateful day in May 1998, when all traffic stopped for fourteen months.
What remains of the Littlefinger Notebook was discovered quite by accident when the only known survivor of the Great Jam tried to pawn it in a shop in downtown Des Moines in 2002, three years after the Jam was brought to its gruesome ending by Moveway Engineers. The man, who carried no papers and was never identified, was one of the worst cases of Jambreakdown, or Jam Psychosis, on record, according to the U.S. Board of Jam Surgeons. When taken into custody, he was in such a state of advance Jambreakdown that, unfortunately, he was unable to answer coherently the simplest questions.
It should be noted, however, that officials of the Moveway Historical Society and other interested parties never had a chance to question the man, since while he was being taken from the pawnshop to the Des Moines General Hospital the ambulance became snagged in a routine jam (three days), and he died before it could be broken up. Thus, it has never been learned I how he came into possession of the last pages of the Notebook. Many think, including P. T. Townsend, Chief, U.S. Bureau of Moveway Investigation, that the short, skinny, middle-aged man took it from Littlefinger’s outstretched, lifeless hand immediately after the “end” of the Jam. This is pure guesswork, of course. That the man was a Jam escapee has been verified, however, largely on the testimony of Jam Surgeons: they reported that his body, upon examination, demonstrated overwhelming physiological characteristics of complete Jam breakdown, including symptoms of exhaust fumes in the blood, gasoline in the urine, and oil in both. In any event, the Jam escapee, evidently not realizing the value of the pages from the Littlefinger Notebook, failed to bring it to the attention of the authorities. It is indeed sadly ironic to note that if a Jam-crazed man had not needed money, the world today would not now have the opportunity to read such a startling report of life as lived in the last few days of the Great Fourteen-Month Moveway Jam.
The unknown possessor took excellent care of the few pages of the Notebook, however. They were well wrapped in strong brown paper when he brought them to the pawnshop. Only a few pages were in any way damaged; although rain soaked, they were legible and shed much light on the final days of the Jam when Moveway Engineers arrived in Jam Helicopters and put into effect their chilling solution to the massive problem.
Unfortunately, the vast bulk of the Notebook was never recovered: Littlefinger left it behind when he and a group of Jamees began their march to The Wall, which Moveway Engineers had built around the Jam in order to stop motorists from deserting their vehicles and escaping the Jam on foot. Fortunately, however, the part of the Notebook recovered contains the account of the march.
According to the Moveway Historical Society, Littlefinger and other Jam-ees began their march from the only part of the Jam where there was some semblance of order and civilization, an area which they had ironically named Moveville. Stretching ahead of the ragged, hungry group (made up of about twenty-five percent of the population of Moveville) were about thirty miles of what they called Unincorporated Jamland, where wild, starving Jam-ees roamed, as the notebook shall reveal.
By the time they began their march, Jam-ees were in a state of insurrection against Moveway authorities; after fourteen months of frustration, they were in no mood to accept any further announcements from hovering Moveway Engineer helicopters that the Jam was about to be broken, especially when the ’copters gradually decreased the number of emergency food deliveries and began dropping more and more suicide capsules. Out of desperation, then, they decided that some of the stronger Jam-ees would try to reach and climb over The Wall and at least let the world know of their plight.
Who was Henry Littlefinger? Little is known. Fragile yet tough, unimpressive yet of a nature that attracted people and their confidences, small, wiry, downright skinny toward the end, with a beaklike nose and steadying owllike eyes, he was born about 1950 on a Moveway (in those days, of course, called a freeway) in the middle of Moveway City (then with the name of Los Angeles) while in a car going eighty-five miles an hour. From that day on, according to his parents, Harry and Hilda Littlefingeç now of Fairbanks, Alaska, he was scared to death of, and had a hatred for, Moveways.
And ironic, too, is that Littlefinger never knew the cause of the Jam that killed him: A little old lady, signaling for a right turn in Ventura, made a left turn instead.
THE LAST PAGES OF THE LITTLEFINGER NOTEBOOK
July 10, 1999 – We are now camped an estimated eleven miles from Moveville, our group of 167 exhausted men sprawled about in an area roughly the size of half a city block. I write this by shaded flashlight; fortunately, among my provisions in my blue panel truck when the Jam began was a large supply of batteries. (Unfortunately, I left my Notebook in Moveville; I write on pages scrounged from the men with me.) We did not light campfires. We are wary. This morning as we “marched” away from Moveville at dawn a Moveway Engineer helicopter darted in over us, fluttered there a.moment, then sped back toward Moveway City. And twice during the day we were observed by other ’copters. We ran for cover, squirming under and in the rusting cars all about us; I’m afraid, however, that we were seen.
Although the Boy Scout movement in the United States hs in recent years been severely handicapped because of the absence of wooded areas, they being covered by cement, we are fortunate in having with us an Eagle Scout, George Barnstrong, who with his trusty compass and other directional gadgets, of which I know absolutely nothing, has mapped out the most direct route to that point of The Wall which we think is nearest Moveville. We have no way of knowing exactly, of course, since our sole source of information has been the two scouts we sent out, a few weeks ago, neither of whom returned and we assume are dead. However, we are of the opinion, based on pre-Jam observation, that Jams are usually longer than they are wide. Thus, we are moving in a south-westerly direction, mostly across, ove and through cars, from side to side – sometimes actually opening the door, sliding across the seat, and leaving by the other side. often to the surprise of the “uncivilized” motorists who make up the inhabitants of the unincorporated areas of Jamland. This, plus the fact that most cars are Jammed-in bumper to bumper, plus that today was frying hot, plus our weakened condition, has resulted in our exceedingly slow rate of travel. Too – and with great sadness I report this – we lost three men today: Adobe James, William Funhouse, and Nicholas Funk. They collapsed one by one during the day. We could not bury them, of course. We could hardly dig our way through at least a foot of Moveway without proper tools even if we had the strength. We placed their bodies on tops of deserted autos; we hope that helicopter hearses will pick them up, thinking they are the “uncivilized.”
We move in more or less a westerly direction – like pioneers of old, we tell ourselves somewhat grimly – because, in addition to hoping that it is the shortest route to the Jam limit, we hope that Moveway Engineers have not built The Wall along the Pacific. (We hope to reach the ocean at a point about tour miles north of Laguna Beach.) Certainly they think the ocean will retain us! Too, I suppose the sea attracts us, just as it beckoned to those plodding pioneers of a bygone era. (Bygone?) How joyous it will be to see something – water! – besides automobiles! How lovely it will be to see girls wearing something – bikinis! – besides Jam Survival Suits.
The unincorporated area of Jamland that we passed through today was in chaos. Rusting cars of all descriptions, windows broken, tires and seats missing – for “firewood.” More ghastly, though, are the skeletons – the human skeletons. They are everywhere: in, under, on top of, and beside automobiles. Bones of children are extremely pathetic.
July 11, 1999 – We made only about six miles today and are now camped, by rough estimate, about seventeen miles from Moveville. Our progress was slowed considerably by helicopters. We saw the first one about 10:15 A.M as we were passing through desolation similar to that which I wrote about yesterday. We saw the ’copter before he saw us; as soon as we sighted him in the distance, we dived beneath the rusting cars until he flew over and away. He was flying very slowly and low, obviously looking for us. As soon as he disappeared. we came out from under the cars and continud our march. The second ’copter delayed us considerably, however. He saw us. We had stopped for lunch, were sprawled about, when suddenly one of the smaller and speedier Moveway Engineer helicopters – fitted with a noise abater – darted over us hardly ten feet of the Moveway. We clearly saw the pilot looking down at us through the bottom of the control bubble. Nevertheless, we dived under the surrounding automobiles, staying there for exactly one hour and forty-seven minutes before we crawled out and continued on our way. A number of our group had fallen asleep under the cars, and another fifteen minutes were wasted waking them up. One, James Lupo, was dead.
We had hardly started our weary march again, though, when another ’copter, the speedier type again, zoomed over our lunch stop and dropped a small parachute, the kind used for communication purposes. It was a communication, all right! Bill Smitt and I rushed to the chute, opened the small pouch attached, and read the following letter which I copied in full. It read:
Federal Bureau of Moveway Engineers,
Western Division
12643 Moveway Avenue
Moveway City, California 90029
July 11, 1999To: The Insurrectionists
Subject: Insurrection
Gentlemen:
You are hereby notified that by departing your vehicles in Moveville on or about July 10, 1999, you are in direct violation of Federal Moveway Law 73, Section 3, Paragraph 14, which reads: “Any operator of a motor vehicle, or person capable of operating a motor vehicle in which he is a passenger, who leaves said vehicle without express authority of the Federal Bureau of Moveway Engineers, while said vehicle is entering, within, or leaving a Moveway Jam, shall be executed by the means most available.”You are also hereby notified that by the power vested in me as Chief of the Bureau of Moveway Erjgineers, Western Division, I am, and do cheerfully accept the obligation, to enforce all laws under my jurisdiction.
You are observed, gentlemen. You are in danger. Return to your vehicles at once or be prepared to accept the consequences.
Very truly yours.
(Signed) P T. McSniffle, Chief Federal Bureau of Moveway Engineers, Western Division
cc: Hdqrtrs., ME. Washington, D.C.
File, 1-14
Moveway City Mortuary, Jam. Div.
July 12, 1999 – Five more men died the day before yesterday (William Snofly, Norman Mendicat, John Brumfield, Peter Downey, and George Moundtop) and seven died today (Harry Flow, Nathan Foulpine, Samuel Week, Philip Dugan, John Downdike, James Peters, and Mike Thomas). Fifteen dead so far. Our original 167 men are now down to 152; we have lost nearly a man a mile.
We voted on what action to take after we received McSniffle’s letter yesterday. I’m proud to report that to a man we decided to continue the March, which we did immediately, our eyes on the sky as much as on the Moveway. We saw only one more helicopter, and that from a distance. Knowing we were observed, we did not attempt to hide.
This morning (I write this, as usual, at our overnight campsite) we started out as soon as it was light. Most men did not sleep well. They are wary, they are afraid. We had hoped to reach the Pacific – or The Wall – today; our scout leader had estimated it to be about thirteen miles from last night’s campsite. We didn’t make it. It happened this way:
A few minutes after three we heard the roar of approaching helicopters; a glance showed us that there must have been at least a dozen and that they were coming from all directions. We shot under and into any vehicle within reach. They roared overhead in a thunderous armada. Cautiously I inched my head out from under the auto I was under. The first thing I saw were the guns. Each ’copter had at least two, front and back. They pointed Movewayward. After roaring over us, one by one, their guns, still silent, aimed at us, they flew outward about 100 yards, grouped, and then in a great circle flew around the area where we were hidden – as if they were flying Indians and we were in a circled wagon train, Then we heard the guns.
At their first chatter I – and I’m sure every man – ducked backlor protection. Then, not seeing – or feeling – any bullets around me, I got up enough nerve to inch my head back out from under the car. The ’copters, still flying their circle, were shooting not at us but in an area directly below them – sort of a Jamland version of firing over your head. They were literally tearing up that portion of the Jam with machine guns. This went on for about four minutes; it was an extremely terrifying experience. At any moment I expected them to move in over us with their guns.
Then, abruptly, the firing stopped. They all flew off except one. The one made a dart over us, and as he sped off I saw a parachute floating down toward us. I was one of the first to reach it. It was another letter from McSniffle. In somewhat flowery language, it warned us that if we did not immediately turn back, we could expect “the same murderous fire that you have witnessed today to be directed unerringly at your insurrecting bodies.”
We voted at once. We decided to go on. We waited until darkness; then, after a cold meal we continued the March. Although there were no casualties from the guns, two men had died during the firing, probably from heart attacks (Pete Snick and Joe Newhouser).
We stopped a little after midnight. I write this by shaded flashlight from our moonlit campsite. Around me men sleep fitfully.
Tomorrow the Pacific!
Or The Wall.
July 13, 1999 – We started out this morning before dawn, hoping to reach our destination by daylight. A count in the darkness revealed that three men were missing. A hasty search uncovered only one – dead (George Hoston). We moved on. To track down the others would have taken up our so important time. They are probably dead anyway (Nick Appleton and Francis Bowen).
By dawn our hopes had been smashed. As we neared the Pacific just north of Laguna Beach, as we began to actually hear the surf, and as the darkness faded, we saw It – The Wall. A monstrous thing of gray stone at least a dozen feet high, with barbed wire along the top. And as we reached it, we saw one … two … three … four skeletons along its base, evidently poor wretches who had tried to scale the thing.
I say our hopes were smashed. Not actually, for we would climb The Wall. Yet we had so hoped to see the Pacific. It seemed to be right behind The Wall. The Moveway, of course, extends right up to the waterline (as it does on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, too), so there was no sand beneath our feet even though we were probably standing where sand ought to have been.
With the immediate prospect of finally being on the Outside, plus that it was dangerous to tarry, we soon overcame our initial disappointment and eagerly began to roll the closest automobile – a rusty Chevrolet Whoosh! – up to The Wall. With some 140 men trying to lend a hand, the task was over before it had hardly started. The car hit The Wall with a great rusty, dusty crunch. Immediately Bill Smitt and Lawrence Lardicart climbed up on its roof; this put them about seven feet below the edge of The Wall. “Come up one by one, men,” said Smitt, “We’ll boost you over. You, Hank, first. Use your clippers on the wire.” (Hank Lawnsdown, a metal smith.)
What we would have done once over The Wall I don’t know – swim, I suppose. As it turned out, that problem never plagued us.
Lawnsdown had got on the car and was being boosted up toward the edge of The Wall when the helicopters came – by the dawn’s early light. Their machine guns began chattering immediately. The first few bursts ripped into Smitt and Lawnsdown. They fell to the Moveway. More bullets poured into the cluster of men waiting to climb onto the car. Many fell, screaming. Some dragged themselves of f toward the surrounding automobiles. Most did not move. The remainder panicked; they ran in all directions. The helicopters continued firing – there must have been five or six of them. They pumped bullets into the running men mercilessly. It was pure slaughter. They fell like flies. I was some seventy-five feet from Smitt and Lawnsdown – maybe more – when the firing began, and somewhat apart from the men grouped around the car. This is what probably saved me – and that I was, by pure luck, standing next to a flatbed truck still partially loaded with concrete blocks. I don’t remember actually jumping under it, but I watched the slaughter from under its protection. The whole area was filled with screaming, cursing, groaning, and blood. If any of our men fired what weapons they had, I did not see it. Bullets, of course, went right through the automobiles that most of the men flung themselves under. The ’copters came back again and again; they raked the area without letup. One man crawled under the truck with me. Blood poured from his foot. He groaned, looked at me with eyes glazed with shock, then collapsed, dead. Then I saw blood spewing from his chest.
Suddenly the firing stopped. A great moaning silence took its place, except for the clatter of choppers. I peeked out from under the truck. The sky was thick with ’copters; more had arrived. And guns protruding from their bellies, they began to settle down toward what was left of us.
How I escaped undetected I’ll never koow. God must have been with me. I simply crawled out from under the truck, in the direction that took me away from The Wall. and wormed my way under a car, then left that car, picked the one closest to it, and crawled to and under that one, avoiding open spaces as much as possible, for I felt sure that the ’copters would land in them. How long I kept ths up I’m not sure. I only know that I stopped only when I was too exhausted to go on; and when I could no longer hear any sounds from the Moveway Engineers, I lay there panting.
I must have dozed, because the sun was high when I looked out from under the car. My hands were scraped and bruised from my flight; the front of my Jam Survival Suit was torn. The sky was clear of ’copters. I heard not one sound. I crawled on aimlessly, staying under vehicles as much as possible. I saw not one living soul, although there was an occasional skeleton. I suppose the firing scared all the “humans” of Unincorporated Jamland away. My thirst was terrible; a blazing sun had broken through the usual smog. My weakness was nearly overpowering. I had lost all food and water. I had to stop after having crawled only a very short distance.
I must have dozed again. The next thing I remember was that the sun was nearly down. Quickly, before darkness fell, I began to write the day’s horrible happenings, which I now have just done. Now I am trying to think what to do. Shall I try to make it back to Moveville? I doubt if I could make it, with no food, rio water, and nothing in between except a prairie of rusting automobiles and childlike “savages.” If I went back to The Wall, how could I get over it? I cannot bring myself to return to the scene of the massacre, even if the Chevrolet is still next to The Wall, even if I had strength to climb it and somehow go over the top of The Wall. Probably the Moveway Men have Moved the car away, anyway. And they would certainly be there for the next few days, cleaning up the mess they made. I think the best thing for me to do is to head back toward The Wall to a point some distance from where we first encountered it. In the morning I shall risk a climb to the top of a car here, find The Wall (I have not crawled far from it, I’m sure), and start crawling toward it. Perhaps I can find some method to get over it.
Or under it?
July 14, 1999 – This will be hard to read. Editor’s note: This portion of Littlefinger’s Notebook was almost illegible, the reason for which will be shortly known. I am hardly in a position to write well-formed words and well-formed sentences. I write feverishly. There is so little time left.
To go back –
I was awakened last night by the clattering sound of many helicopters, some passing over me and others some distance away. At the same time I heard a different noise, a mystifying patter similar to the sound of falling hail, although not as intense. Crawling out from inside the automobile I was sleeping in to investigate, I was immediately struck by two or three small, lightweight objects. I heard others hit the Moveway around me, one bounced from a tender and landed right in front of me: I could see it in the moonlight. When I picked it up I was chilled to my very soul; and after I had examined it by the best angle of moonlight and noted its color, I knew I was not mistaken, although I swore to God that I might be.
Moveway Engineers were showering Jamland with thousands of suicide capsules!
And by morning I knew why.
I barely slept from that point on. At dawn I crawled out from inside my car. All around me were suicide capsules – dozens of them in my immediate area, in all their green malevolence. I was seized with an indescribable fury. Cursing, I began to grind every capsule I could see underfoot.
It was as if fourteen months’ worth of frustration burst out of me, concentrated into one minute of fury I was soon exhausted. I am very weak. As I sprawled out to rest I saw one capsule nearly hidden behind a wheel. At first I thought I would smash it, too, as soon as I had regained my strength. But when I got up in a few minutes, I found myself putting the capsule in the pocket of my Jam Survival Suit reserved for just such pills of instant death. Editor’s note: These suits were dropped from helicopters in the early days of the Jam.
When with painful effort I climbed to the top of the car I had slept under I saw that The Wall was about a mile away. I was about to climb back down to the Moveway when I took one quick glance in the direction of Moveway City. I saw a dark mass and then heard the beginning of a deafening roar.
Then – I could not believe what I saw. Approaching Jamland were hundreds of helicopters.
I hurried down and scrambled under the automobile. The ground literally shook as they approached. The roar was overpowering. I risked a peek out. The sky was black with the whirling monsters. They were all the large KILs – the biggest helicopter made, large enough to lift two tanks. As I watched, and as they passed over The Wall, I saw a stream of something fall from the leading ’copter; and then as each machine passed over The Wall it, too, dropped a stream of what appeared to be a grayish, mucky substance. As soon as each ’copter dumped its load, it turned back toward Moveway City. In following the return of one fo a second, I saw a second great cloud of helicopters approaching. Then, looking off to north and south, I saw more gigantic clusters of the machines, all coming toward Jamland. And as I watched, each of these ’copters also dropped something – a load of something – onto the Jammed cars as soon as it passed over The Wall.
Jamland was being covered up by something dropped by hundreds – thousands – of helicopters! No wonder suicide capsules were dropped during the night.
In a matter of minutes the ’copters were dropping their loads a goodly distance from The Wall – in my direction. Each dropped load easily equaled that of a large dump truck. In the spot where each load was dropped a mound of a gray, mucky substance appeared, then settled a bit until it was nearly level with the tops of the cars. I watched, horror stricken. Closer and closer they dumped. I could not stay under the car, I would be covered by the muck, There was no firing. In fact, I saw no guns protruding from the ’copters.
Then I realized what I was seeing. These ’copters were the specially made ones used in Moveway construction. They had probably been assembled from various parts of the United States for the job they were doing now.
And as one dropped his load scarcely fifty feet from me I realized what they were dropping and what they were doing.
They were dropping wet cement. They were making a new Moveway over the old Moveway.
I quickly climbed from beneath the car and got inside it. Fortunately it was a sedan and in relatively good condition. I ran up all the windows but one – and just in time. With a tremendous slushing thump, a load of cement hit the top of the car and the surrounding area. As it mounted up the side of the car, I shot through the open window and onto the roof again, just ahead of the rising wet goo. It leveled off just below the top of the car. As I reached my new position, another ’copter dropped a load so close to me that I was splattered and nearly knocked over but I whipped out my Notebook and began to write furiously. It was obvious that a second assault would put the cement over my head. They probably intended to make the new Moveway level with the top of The Wall. I thought fleetingly of trying to make it to The Wall by jumping from cartop to cartop. There were many spaces, though, where no tops showed, where the spaces were too great to jump over. Those damn sports cars! Could I swim in wet cement? I decided I couldn’t. So I sat on top of my car and wrote and wrote and wrote – which is what I’m doing at this exact moment.
Thousands of helicopters are now overhead, coming and going, dumping their loads and flying back for more. Such a gigantic effort (it looks as if they want to finish in time for lunch) must have been the result of a congressional investigation. After all, this Jam has been the longest on record, and something just had to be done, and done fast.
The cement is creeping over the roof of my car now. I am now sitting in it. It feels most disagreeable. I stand up. I write while holding my Notebook on my chest. It is the only thing I have left.
In the distance I see a few Jam-ees also on tops of cars. Not many. A half a dozen or so. The other poor creatures are probably too weak to climb onto the roofs. I try not to think of my friends in Moveville.
By the thousands! Never have I seen so many helicopters. The sky is a black fury of them. Tons and tons of cement falling.
Another wave approaches me, dropping cement as they come, peeling back. More coming.
The cement is rising, constantly finding its own level. There are so many tons of it in this area of Jamland now that every load, no matter where dropped, raises the level a fraction. And tons are being dropped.
The level is now just below my knees.
What can I write? There is nothing new.
I just saw a man who was on a car some 100 yards from me disappear. A load of cement hit him squarely.
And another just toppled over. Suicide?
Here comes a load. Editor’s note: This sentence was scrawled out so badly it is assumed Littlefinger wrote it as he was actually ducking. Spots of cement were found on this page.
It hit about 100 feet from me. Cement is now at my waist. I must raise my hands to write.
Suicide?
Another load is approaching. Here it comes.
Just missed me. Hit about fifty feet a-
Cement up to neck now.
Write with Notebook over head.
At chin.
Can’t die like this.
I am going
At lips.
I have taken the capsule.
It is gone.
Good b-
Editor’s note: It may well be assumed, although there is no supporting evidence, that Henry Littlefinger died holding the pages of his Notebook over his head, above the cement, and that, some time later, it was thus found in his death grip. One must imagine that that unknown man, that finder of the Notebook pages, that only known survivor of the Great Fourteen-Month Moveway Jam, somehow escaped the onslaught of the “dump-truck helicopters” that fateful day. One must also imagine him for some reason cautiously creeping out over the just-hardened, or hardening, cement the next morning, or later that same day, and coming upon Littlefinger’s Notebook pages and hand. As readers may know, Moveway Engineers ceased dumping cement at a level corresponding roughly to the height of a man standing on the roof of a Jammed car, plus about one foot. And since the Notebook pages were not encrusted with cement, it would appear that they were not buried in it. Later, of course, after the original cement had entirely hardened, Engineers dumped the final layer, which brought the level of the new Moveway up to the edge of The Wall – and covered Littlefinger’s hand, wherever it may be, that hand that wrote so much for the enlightenment of so many.
A near-analog in real life: China National Highway 110 traffic jam in 2010
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