The Railroad Never Sleeps: 24 Hours in the Life of Modern Railroading - Hardcover

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9780760331194: The Railroad Never Sleeps: 24 Hours in the Life of Modern Railroading

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0760331197 ISBN 13: 9780760331194

Publisher: Voyageur Press, 2008

For well over a century and a half the railroad has rolled on, crisscrossing the continent in the ceaseless activity that keeps the North American economy moving. This never-ending workday unfolds hour by hour in The Railroad Never Sleeps, a remarkable photographic chronicle of North American railroading over twenty-four hours.

On May 10, 2007, the anniversary of the Golden Spike ceremony marking the completion of the first U.S. transcontinental railroad, several of todays top railroad photographers set out for every corner of the continent to capture the railroad in action at every hour of the day and night. The result is a magnificent portrait of railroading across the vast canvas of North America, from rural outpost to urban center, port city to Great Plains, dawn to dusk to deepest night.

The breathtaking photographs and detailed captions depict every type of railroading--heavy-haul unit trains, intermodal, modern passenger and commuter lines, short-line services, and more. Together they create a complete picture of the motive power, rolling stock, workers, and operations that keep North American life and business on the rails.

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About the Author:

Brian Solomon is one of today's most accomplished railway historians. He has authored more than thirty books about railroads and locomotive power, and his writing and photography have been featured in the world's top rail publications, including Trains, Railway Age, Passenger Train Journal, and RailNews. He divides his time between Massachusetts and Ireland.John Gruber is a respected railroad photographer, author, editor, and historian. In 1994 he received the prestigious Railway and Locomotive Historical Society's lifetime achievement award for photography. Gruber is currently the president of the Center for Railroad Photography and Art. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin.

Foreword By John Gruber Founder, Center for Railroad Photography & Art Madison, Wisconsin

The ceremony marking the completion of the first transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869 was a landmark event not just in railroading but in the history of photography. The same date 138 years later, when photographs were made for this book, represents another landmark in photographic endeavors: The photographs in this book contribute immensely to our understanding of our railroad heritage, which is as much visual as textual. Brian Solomon, who assembled the team of 37 enthusiastic photographers that provided the images for this book, is himself an accomplished photographer and writer, with more than 30 books to his credit. Following his direction, the team spread out across North America to create this remarkable record of railroad work at all hours of a single day. Limiting their work to one day forced the photographers in this book to take chances. Sometimes the most interesting subject matter presents itself during the least inspiring light, and sometimes the light falls on nothing but empty track (which is also a part of the story). These challenges aside, with modern transportation and cameras, any one of the photographers represented on these pages could accomplish more in a day than an 1869 golden spike photographer such as Andrew J. Russell could manage in an entire summer. Since 1869, dry plates replaced wet ones about 1880, vastly increasing output. High-quality halftone reproduction in the early 1900s made ink-on-paper reproductions feasible in unlimited quantity. In 1935, Kodachrome film added color to the palate of possibilities. Today, we live in another time of transition as computer chips supplant film for some photographers. Still, for this book, 55 percent of the work was on film, and the result actually builds on a tradition dating to the daguerreotypes of the 1840s and linking railroads and photography. It is a tradition that we at the Center for Railroad Photography & Art continue and celebrate as we preserve and present significant images of railroading--both creative and traditional ways of looking at the scene. Solomon and the photographers featured join that long line of early photographers who crossed the countryside to gather material for books: Men such as Russell in The Great West Illustrated in a Series of Photographic Views across the Continent: Taken Along the Line of the Union Pacific (1869); Joseph G. Pangborn in Picturesque B. and O.: Historical and Descriptive (1882); and Charles A. Higgins' To California and Back (1893). William Henry Jackson's expansive tours (for example, he moved from the Chicago & North Western in the Midwest to the Santa Fe in the West and Lackawanna in the East in 1898-1899) are little recognized except in postcards from the Detroit Photographic Company, but also are significant. Some precedents to Solomon and company, especially with the growth of documentary photography in the 1930s, presented excellent treatments of railroad work and workers. The federal government's Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information were foremost with Jack Delano's photographs of the railroads in the Chicago area and on freight trains to Los Angeles. Horace Bristol photographed the Southern Railway's Charlotte Division for Life magazine in 1938 and Southern Pacific in color for Fortune in 1942. Lucius Beebe (later with Charles Clegg) brought railroad photography back into the public eye in the late 1930s. David P. Morgan, Trains editor from 1953 to 1987, showed exceptional skill in picture selection, often including views of people at work. In The Railroad Never Sleeps, Solomon recognizes the accomplishments of everyday workers, an important theme for us at the Center for Railroad Photography & Art. "Day-in-the-life" books started appearing in droves during the 1960s. Those first "day" volumes were tributes to the high and mighty, such as Jim Bishop's days in the lives of Presidents Kennedy (1964) and Johnson (1967). It was left to Solomon and Voyageur Press not only to produce a railroad volume based on the "day" idea, but one that makes significant contributions to our understanding of contemporary railroading--including its workers. Like photography, railroads, have undergone transitions. In the United States, they operated 46,844 miles of road in 1869. In 1916, that figure peaked with 254,037 miles of road, and declined to 205,782 in 1970, and to 140,810 miles operated (less trackage rights) in 2005. Employment jumped from 419,000 in 1880 to 1,701,000 in 1916. By 2005, it was reduced to 181,807. Nevertheless, railroading today is anything but dull; you'll find color, excitement, and magnificent landscapes throughout the pages of The Railroad Never Sleeps. Contributors found endless photo opportunities in the seven Class 1 freight railroads, plus Amtrak, commuter lines in more than a dozen cities, and hundreds of regional and short lines. Our railroad heritage is also alive and well in such places as the Oakland Museum of California, with its magnificent Russell collection; the Center for Railroad Photography & Art, with its seven exhibits about railroad work that have been displayed on the East and West Coasts and at 10 locations in between (including Grand Central Terminal in New York City and the Wisconsin state capitol in Madison), and its growing Internet archive; an array of libraries and museums; and in the hands of today's photographers. In Solomon's view, there is no single way to make images. Some photographers excel at a traditional approach; others find inspiration in making more interpretive images. In making the final selections for this volume, Solomon balanced cutting-edge photos with illustrative photos and made little effort to classify one from the other. His ideas promote positive photographic discussion. Enjoy, and let the creativity inside inspire your own.

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