Originally the song WAS a contrived song about a mythical train that would go anywhere the guys needed to go. It was invented by the knights of the road. The song got so popular among the hobos riding the rods that, eventually, the Wabash Railroad named their crack run after it. The train became popular also. Right now I'm looking at an old schedule for the train on that line. Eastbound, it left St. Louis at 9:15 AM daily. Went through (with stops in) Decatur, Danville, Lafayette, Logansport, Peru, Huntington, Fort Wayne, Toledo and Detroit. Westbound, it left Detroit at 8:00 AM and arrived in St. Louis at 4:20 PM.

Another text variation says:
"We'll ship him off to hell on the Wabash Cannonball."
(THE HOBOS HORNBOOK by Geo. Milburn--1930)

Paul Durst's version also had this variation: "There's a train of "doozy" layout, quite well known to all..."
The "Deusenberg" was a classy auto in the early days of the 20th century.---The song seems to date from the days after the Civil War--when all the guys and gals came home & couldn't find work. This was a cheap way to get from a place of no work to a place where they might find some sort of job. But the automobile reference sort of dates this verse to the 1920s and 30s--a depression version.

Another of Paul's variations was:

This train she runs through Quincy, Monroe and Mexico,(Missouri),
Heads into Kansas City--she isn't runnin' slow,
Heads on into Denver and makes an awful squawl,
They all know her by her whistle, it's the Wabash Cannonball.
If you connect the dots on the map between the towns above, you'll draw a line through the Midwest---but a totally different route than that of the actual W.C.

( All the engineers, like the great pilots on the rivers, had very distinctive ways of blowing their whistles in the days of steam.)
Paul's version is available on cassette only now (by me) "On The Wilderness Road"--C-105(I think) Folk Legacy Records...

{another version soon--from Paul Durst}

Art Thieme