Starlight on the Rails

Text by Jeff Brouws. A powerful strand of mid-20th-century American folklore found romance in trains. The railway photographs in this amazing volume -- all taken at night and resulting from the most demanding technical efforts -- capture these bygone scenes.

Jeff Brouws grew up around the San Francisco Bay area, simultaneously discovering trains, photography, and the writings of Jack Kerouac (who was a brakeman for the Southern Pacific in the early 1950s) at the age of thirteen. His photographic work has been published in several books, including Railroading West (1976) and Highway: America's Endless Dream (1997). Edward Delvers grew up in Japan at a time when steam was still king. After his family returned to the United States, he traveled the country photographing trains through the late 1960s, then studied photographic science at MIT under the tutelage of Dr. Harold Edgerton. He has made a career in numerous fields, ranging from energy research to satellite communications to aviation, meanwhile maintaining photography as a passion.