A Train Song

Trains, Music, Legends

Get on Board, Little Children

June 8, 2020 /

“The Gospel train’s comin’
I hear it just at hand
I hear the car wheel rumblin’
And rollin’ thro’ the land” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman was the most famous conductor on the Underground Railroad. She was born a slave in Dorchester County, Maryland, some time between 1820 – 1822. Called Araminta Ross at birth, she took the name Harriet (Tubman was her married name) when she escaped from a plantation with two of her brothers in 1849.

Tubman returned to the Maryland plantation several times, to rescue family members and other slaves. On one of her trips she tried to convince her husband to come with her, but he had remarried and refused to leave.

Tubman would eventually make some 13 forays back into Maryland to rescue as many as 70 people. One group at a time she would bring with her out of the state, travelling by night in extreme secrecy. She became known as “Moses”, and “never lost a passenger”.

After the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was passed, allowing runaway slaves to be retrieved from Northern “free” states to be returned to their owners in the South, Tubman began guiding the fugitives farther north, into Canada.

  • John Brown
  • Harriet Tubman

In 1858 Harriet Tubman met John Brown, helping him plan and recruit supporters for his 1859 raid on the federal armory in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), for which Brown was eventually tried and hanged for treason.

Federal Armory, Harpers Ferry

During the Civil War Tubman served the Union Army in a number of capacities, first as a cook and a nurse, later as an armed scout and spy. She was the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war, when she guided the raid at Combahee Ferry, liberating more than 700 slaves.

“Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
There’s room for many more” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

The Underground Railroad was a secret network of routes and safe houses established in the US as early as the late 18th-century. The network was begun by abolitionist groups to aid African-American slaves in escaping to Northern free states and later, after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, into Canada.

The Quakers are considered the first group to actively help slaves escape bondage. George Washington claimed in 1786 that Quakers had attempted to “liberate” one of his slaves. In the Early 1800s Quakers in Philadelphia, and in North Carolina began organizing routes and shelters to aid escaping slaves.

The earliest mention of the Underground Railroad came in 1831 when a slave owner blamed an “underground railroad” for helping one of his slaves escape to freedom from Kentucky into Ohio. Then in 1839, a Washington newspaper reported an escaped slave named Jim having revealed, under torture, his plan to go north following an “underground railroad to Boston.”

In the 1830s, vigilance committees were created in New York and Philadelphia to help protect escaped slaves from bounty hunters. Soon their activities expanded to guiding fugitive slaves, and the term Underground Railroad became part of the American vernacular.

“I hear the train a-comin‘
She’s comin’ round the curve
She’s loosened all her steam and brakes
And strainin’ ev’ry nerve” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

The Underground Railroad was not literally underground or a railroad. It was “underground” in the sense that it was organized and functioned in extreme secrecy. To reduce the risk of discovery, many of the people involved knew only their part of the route or scheme, with instructions becoming “coded” and using familiar railroad terminology.

Fugitive slaves traveled in small groups at night, led by a “conductor”, who would guide them 10-20 miles at a time, to the next “station” or “depot”, where they would rest during the day, typically hidden in a barn, under a floor, or in a cave. The depots were operated by a complicit “stationmaster”.

Underground Railroad “Station”

“Stockholders” were abolitionist supporters who may not be involved in the actual transportation of fugitive slaves, but contributed money or supplies to the organization.

Escaping slaves began using biblical terminology, referring to Canada as “heaven”, or “the promised land”, while calling the Ohio River, the “River Jordan”. Slaves planning an escape would need to “obtain a ticket” on what became known as “the freedom train” or “Gospel Train”.

“Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
There’s room for many more” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

William Still, sometimes called “The Father of the Underground Railroad”, was chairman of the Vigilance Committee of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. Sometimes hiding fugitives in his Philadelphia home, he helped hundreds of slaves to escape (as many as 60 a month). He kept careful records, including short biographies of the people that contained frequent railway metaphors. He maintained correspondence with many of them, helping to reunite families once they reached freedom. He later published these accounts in the book The Underground Railroad: Authentic Narratives and First-Hand Accounts (1872), which proved a great resource for helping historians to understand how the system worked.

“The fare is cheap and all can go
The rich and poor are there
No second class aboard this train
No difference in the fare” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

“Follow the Drinking Gourd” is an African American folk song first published in 1928. According to legend, the song was used by a conductor of the Underground Railroad, called Peg Leg Joe, to guide fugitive slaves using the Big Dipper (the Drinking Gourd), and the North Star to navigate themselves northward on their nightly “railroad” excursions.

In John A. Lomax’s 1934 book American Ballads & Folk Songs, he quotes a story from H.B Parks: “One of my great-uncles, who was connected with the railroad movement, remembered that in the records of the Anti-Slavery Society there was a story of a peg-leg sailor, known as Peg-Leg Joe, who made a number of trips through the South and induced young Negroes to run away and escape… The main scene of his activities was in the country north of Mobile, and the trail described in the song followed northward to the headwaters of the Tombigbee River, thence over the divide and down the Ohio River to Ohio… the peg-leg sailor would… teach this song to the young slaves and show them the mark of his natural left foot and the round hole made by his peg-leg. He would then go ahead of them northward and leave a print made of charcoal and mud of the outline of a human left foot and a round spot in place of the right foot.”

Peg-Leg Joe

Peg-Leg Joe may have been a real person or composite of people but there is no reliable historical evidence of his existence.

“Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
Get on board, little children
There’s room for many more” – The Gospel Train (Traditional)

“The Gospel Train (Get on Board)” is a traditional African-American spiritual first published in 1872 as one of the songs of the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Although the song is usually cited as traditional, several sources credit a Baptist minister from New Hampshire, John Chamberlain, with writing it. The song shares its melody and structure with a number of songs containing similar themes, and may date from an even earlier period.

Regardless of its origin, the song has come to be a representation of African Americans’ struggle to leave the bonds of slavery to journey to the Promised Land, and beyond that, has become a gospel standard, found in the hymnals of many Protestant denominations and has been recorded by numerous artists.

“Get on board, little children . . .”

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gospel_Train

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Railroad

https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/underground-railroad

https://www.biography.com/activist/harriet-tubman

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harriet_Tubman

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songs_of_the_Underground_Railroad

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

I’ll Meet You at the Station

May 25, 2020 /

“Take the last train to Clarksville
And I’ll meet you at the station
You can be there by 4:30
‘Cause I’ve made your reservation
Don’t be slow
Oh, no, no, no . . .” – Last Train to Clarksville (Boyce/Hart) © Sony/ATV Music

Clarksville, TN

Clarksville is the county seat of Montgomery County, Tennessee. It is the fifth-largest city in the state, with an estimated population of 153,205 in 2017. The city was founded in 1785, incorporated in 1807, and named for General George Rogers Clark, frontier fighter and Revolutionary War hero, and brother of William Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

General George Rogers Clark

Clarksville was designated as a town to be settled by soldiers from the disbanded Continental Army that served under General Washington during the Revolutionary War. At the end of the war, with the federal government lacking sufficient funds to repay the soldiers, the Legislature of North Carolina, designated the lands to the west of the state line as federal lands that could be used in the land grant program. As the area of Clarksville had been surveyed and sectioned into plots, the land was available to be settled by the families of eligible soldiers as repayment for service to their country.

Since its inception, the city of Clarksville has had close ties to the military. The city was developed by former Revolutionary War soldiers; during the Civil War a large number of its male population was depleted due to Union Army victories, with many Clarksville men interned at Union prisoner of war camps; Clarksville lost many men in World War I, and World War II saw the formation of Camp Campbell, later Fort Campbell, not far from the city center.

“’Cause I’m leaving in the morning
And I must see you again
We’ll have one more night together
‘Til the morning brings my train
And I must go
Oh, no, no, no . . .” – Last Train to Clarksville (Boyce/Hart)

Fort Campbell is a United States Army base that spans the Kentucky–Tennessee state line. It is located approximately 10 miles from the city center of Clarksville. Though the installation’s post office is in Kentucky, most of its acreage lies in Tennessee. The fort is named in honor of Union Army Brigadier General William Bowen Campbell, a former governor of Tennessee, and is home to the 101st Airborne Division and the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment.

The site for Fort Campbell was selected in July of 1941, with the initial survey completed in November of that same year, about the same time the Japanese Imperial Fleet was leaving Japanese home waters for the attack on Pearl Harbor. Soldiers from Fort Campbell, Kentucky have deployed in every military campaign since the formation of the post.

The first 4,000 paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division arrived in Vietnam in July of 1965, landing at Cam Ranh Bay. Immediately after their arrival, they made a demonstration jump which was observed by Geneneral William Westmoreland and outgoing Ambassador (formerly General) Maxwell Taylor. Taylor and Westmoreland were both former commanders of the division, which was known as the “Screaming Eagles.” The remainder of the 101st would soon be deployed to Vietnam from Fort Campbell.

101st Airborne Division, “Screaming Eagles”

In May of 1966, due to the escalation of action in Vietnam, a Basic Combat Training Center was activated at Fort Campbell. Just weeks later the base received its first 220 newly inducted soldiers.

Side note #1:

In 1961, after a run-in with the law over stolen cars, young James Marshall Hendrix was given the choice to spend two years in prison or join the army. Choosing the army, Pvt. Hendrix was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division and was stationed at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. It was not long before Jimi proved himself wholly unsuited for military life, and although he had signed up for three years, Captain Gilbert Batchman had had enough after one year, and made the case for Hendrix to be discharged, as his problems were judged to not be treatable by “hospitalization or counseling.”

  • Pvt James Hendrix @ Ft. Campbell
  • Pvt Hendrix

“Take the last train to Clarksville
I’ll be waiting at the station
We’ll have time for coffee–flavored kisses
And a bit of conversation, oh
Oh, no, no, no . . .” – Last Train to Clarksville (Boyce/Hart)

As early as 1962, filmmaker Bob Rafelson had developed the idea for The Monkees, but was unable to sell the series. Later he teamed-up with Bert Schneider, whose father was the head of Screen Gems, the television unit of Columbia Pictures, and after seeing the success of The Beatles’ film, A Hard Day’s Night, the pair revived Rafelson’s idea of a show built around an aspiring rock band, and were successful in selling the series to Screen Gems Television.

John Sebastian

Rafelson and Schneider’s original idea was to cast an existing New York folk rock group, The Lovin’ Spoonful, who were not widely known at the time. But John Sebastian had already signed the band to a record contract, which would have left Screen Gems unable to market music from the show. The idea then shifted to having actors portray the four band members, and while each of the four actors who were chosen to portray the The Monkees had some musical experience, it would initially be left to outside songwriters and musicians to provide the show’s musical soundtrack.

Don Kirshner

With The Monkees picked up as a series, Columbia-Screen Gems and RCA Victor entered into a joint venture called Colgems Records to distribute the show’s musical releases. Don Kirshner, Screen Gems’ head of music, was contacted to secure music for the show’s pilot. Kirshner would eventually enlist the talents of Neil Diamond, John Stewart, Carole King, and the duo of Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart, among others, to pen what would become the show’s familiar hits.

  • Neil Diamond
  • John Stewart
  • Carole King

“Take the last train to Clarksville
Now I must hang up the phone
I can’t hear you in this
Noisy railroad station
All alone, I’m feeling low
Oh, no, no, no . . .” – Last Train to Clarksville (Boyce/Hart)

“Last Train to Clarksville” was the show’s first single and first worldwide hit. The song was recorded in July of 1966, and released in August, just a few weeks prior to The Monkees September 12 broadcast debut on the NBC television network. The song topped the Billboard Hot 100 in November of 1966, and would later rank #6 for the year. It was featured in seven episodes of the band’s television series, the most for any Monkees song.

Written by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, the song bears a striking resemblance to The Beatles’ “Paperback Writer”, which is the song that Hart claims inspired him to write “Last Train”. Hart has stated that having turned on the radio to hear the final bars of “Paperback Writer” he believed that Paul McCartney was singing “Take the last train”. Learning that McCartney was actually singing “Paperback writer”, he decided to use the line for his own song.

Knowing that The Monkees TV series was being pitched as a music/comedy series in the spirit of The Beatles movie A Hard Day’s Night, Boyce & Hart set out to emulate the Fab Four as they recorded “Last Train to Clarksville” with their own band, Candy Store Prophets. Actor Mickey Dolenz later added his lead vocal track to the original recording.

About the title of the song Hart has explained, “We were just looking for a name that sounded good. There’s a little town in northern Arizona I used to go through in the summer on the way to Oak Creek Canyon called Clarkdale. We were throwing out names, and when we got to Clarkdale, we thought Clarksville sounded even better. We didn’t know it at the time, [but] there is an Army base near the town of Clarksville, Tennessee — which would have fit the bill fine for the storyline. We couldn’t be too direct with The Monkees. We couldn’t really make a protest song out of it — we kind of snuck it in.”

Side note #2:

In 1967, as The Monkees were about to embark on a US tour, Mickey Dolenz recommended hiring Jimi Hendrix to be their opening act, having recently witnessed his performance at the Monterey Pop Festival. Hendrix had characterized The Monkees’ music as “dishwater”, but his manager convinced him to sign on for the tour, for although he’d already had three hit singles in England, he was virtually unknown in the US. The Jimi Hendrix Experience played just eight of the 29 scheduled tour dates; then, on July 16, 1967, Jimi flipped the Forest Hills, Queens, New York, audience off, threw down his guitar and walked away from the tour.

“Take the last train to Clarksville,
And I’ll meet you at the station,
You can be here by four-thirty,
‘Cause I’ve made your reservation, don’t be slow,
Oh, no, no, no . . .

And I don’t know if I’m ever coming home” – Last Train to Clarksville (Boyce/Hart)

Vietnam Memorial, Washington, DC

The 101st Airborne was the last Army division to leave Vietnam, returning to its home base of Fort Campbell, Kentucky. During the war, troopers from the 101st won 17 Medals of Honor for bravery in combat. The division suffered almost 20,000 soldiers killed or wounded in action in Vietnam, over twice as many as the 9,328 casualties it suffered in World War II.

Never Forget!

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarksville,_Tennessee

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Campbell

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/101st-airborne-division-arrives-in-vietnam

https://www.military.com/veteran-jobs/career-advice/military-transition/famous-veterans-jimi-hendrix.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Train_to_Clarksville

https://www.rhino.com/article/single-stories-the-monkees-last-train-to-clarksville

https://www.songfacts.com/facts/the-monkees/last-train-to-clarksville

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Will I See You Tonight?

May 11, 2020 /

“Outside another yellow moon
Has punched a hole in the nighttime, yes
I climb through the window and down to the street
I’m shining like a new dime” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits) © Audiam, Inc

Thomas Alan Waits was born December 7, 1949, in Pomona, California. He has one older sister and one younger sister. Tom’s mother was a housewife and attended church regularly; his father taught Spanish at a local school and was an alcoholic. He spent his early life in Whittier, California, where he learned to play bugle and guitar. His father taught him to play the ukulele.

During summer school breaks young Tom would spend time with his maternal grandparents in Northern California. Later he would credit his uncle’s raspy, gravelly voice for inspiring what has become his trademark singing style.

When Tom was 10 years old, his parents separated with his father moving away from the family; his mother soon moved with the children to Chula Vista, a suburb of San Diego. It was here that Tom began exploring music to a greater degree. Before long he was fronting bands, imitating the soul and R&B artists of the day, while also showing interest in country music and roots rock ‘n’ roll. Later Bob Dylan would become a big influence with Tom studying the folk icon’s lyrics by writing them on his bedroom wall.

During his high school years Tom would later describe himself as “kind of an amateur juvenile delinquent”, dabbling in “malicious mischief”. He claims he was a “rebel against the rebels”, as he could not subscribe to the philosophies of the hippie subculture that was emerging across the country. Having acquired instead an affinity for the writings of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs, he felt a much stronger kinship to the Beat generation of the 1950s.

At the age of 18 Tom dropped out of high school.

“The downtown trains are full
Full of all those Brooklyn girls
They try so hard to break out of their little worlds” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits)

Waits worked for a time at Napoleone’s pizza restaurant in National City, California; a job that he referenced in his song, “I Can’t Wait to Get Off Work”, and as a solo artist he was soon playing local folk venues and coffeehouses, eventually supporting acts such as Tim Buckley, Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee, and his friend Jack Tempchin. But knowing that playing in San Diego would only ever take him so far, he began driving up the coast to Los Angeles, to play at the Troubadour.

It was while playing at the Troubadour that Tom would first sign a publishing deal, and later would meet David Geffen, who gave Tom a contract with his Asylum Records label.

  • David Geffen © Joel Bernstein
  • Asylum Records

“Well, you wave your hand and they scatter like crows
They have nothing that will ever capture your heart
They’re just thorns without the rose
Be careful of them in the dark” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits)

The first time I saw Tom Waits perform, or ever even heard of him for that matter, was on The Mike Douglas Show. Mike Douglas was a former singer who had sung for the Kay Kyser big band during the swing era, and was also the singing voice of Prince Charming in Walt Disney’s Cinderella. He went on to host his own syndicated afternoon variety show. At its peak The Mike Douglas Show was broadcast in 171 markets, with an estimated six million viewers.

Waits appeared on Douglas’ show on November 19, 1976. His appearance was to promote his album, Small Change, which had been released several months earlier. After being introduced by the host, Waits played “Eggs & Sausage” from his previous album, Night Hawks at the Diner, accompanied by a small combo. He then took a seat next to Douglas, with additional guests Glenda Jackson and Marvin Hamlisch looking on.

Mike Douglas (r) & Tom Waits

After telling his guest that he “project(s) a very strange image”, Douglas asks Waits how he would describe himself. Among other things Waits offers, “I’m an unemployed service station attendant most of the time. I’m just lucky. I’m a living, breathing example of success without college, is what it boils down to.” Further along in the interview Douglas asks Waits whether he likes to be classified as a poet or singer, to which he replies, “I’m a Methodist deep down inside. It’s hard to say”.

Later in the show, Waits performs the title track from Small Change accompanied by a saxophone. If you’ve never heard this “song” I suggest you look it up. It will help you understand how jarring this performance was to my early teen Top 40 sensibilities.

“I know your window and I know it’s late
I know your stairs and your doorway
I walk down your street and past your gate
I stand by the light at the four-way” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits)

To say that Tom Waits’ voice and music are an acquired taste is probably somewhat of an understatement. Many people will never get that far. It wasn’t until more than a decade after my initial exposure that I came to appreciate his talents as a songwriter, if not as a bona vox.

Although Waits rarely gives interviews, when he does sit with a writer it’s typically questionable whether you’re getting the man or his carefully crafted shtick. Because I admire Tom Waits’ songwriting ability, I’ve always been curious how he feels about other artists recording his compositions. It’s easy to say that many of Tom’s songs would be improved when rendered by a friendlier voice, although that may seem blasphemous to Waits purists.

Surely the exposure that he has received from having his songs recorded by others has not hurt his career any. Using as an example “Ol’ ’55”, the first track from his debut album Closing Time, which was subsequently recorded by The Eagles: Waits version of his song was released as a single, but neither the song, nor the album charted; while The Eagles album On the Border, which contained their version of Waits’ song, reached #17 on the Billboard 200 chart, and was certified double platinum, with sales of 2 million units.

When asked about The Eagles recording of “Ol’ ’55” Waits commented that he was “not that particularly crazy about (their) rendition of it … I thought their version was a little antiseptic”.

Later he would remark, “I don’t like the Eagles. They’re about as exciting as watching paint dry. Their albums are good for keeping the dust off your turntable and that’s about all.”

Tom is certainly entitled to his opinion, but there is no doubt that other artists – respected by him, or otherwise – have generated a significant amount of income for the prolific songwriter.

“You watch them as the fall
Oh baby, they all have heart attacks
They stay at the carnival
But they’ll never win you back” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits)

“Downtown Train” is a song from Waits’ 1985 album release Rain Dogs. The album was written and recorded while he was making his home in NYC, and there is no denying the New York grittiness inherent in each of the album’s selections. The lyrics of the song conjure a damp, shadowy urban nightscape, punctuated by the glare and roar of a night train, where the narrator waits to have his desperate desire and longing fulfilled by a perception that may be nothing more than an implausible apparition. But still he waits and asks the same question over and over.

“Will I see you tonight
On a downtown train?
Every night it’s just the same
You leave me lonely, now” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits)

“Downtown Train” soon drew the attention of other artists. Patty Smyth was the first to record the song, releasing her version in 1987. While Tom Waits had never had one of his own recordings crack the Billboard Hot 100 chart, Smyth’s cover rose to #95. Mary Chapin Carpenter included a version on her debut album, also released in 1987.

  • Patty Smyth
  • Mary Chapin Carpenter

Rod Stewart included the song as a last minute addition to his Storyteller anthology, a 4-disc boxed set with recordings spanning his entire career to that point. Stewart’s version of “Downtown Train” reached #3 on the Hot 100, with the anthology reaching #54 on the album charts, and being certified double platinum. It was a number-one single on the album rock and adult contemporary charts, went to number one in Canada and made the top ten on the UK Singles Chart in 1990. Stewart received a Grammy nomination for the song in the category Best Male Pop Vocal performance.

  • Rod Stewart
  • Bob Seger

Bob Seger recorded his own version of the song in 1989, but decided against releasing it after Stewart’s version hit the market. He would later include the track on his 2011 compilation Ultimate Hits: Rock and Roll Never Forgets.

I know that some are not necessarily fond of Rod Stewart’s cover of “Downtown Train”. It’s been criticized for being too pop; too overblown. I happen to be a fan of Rod’s version, particularly for the over-the-top production from Trevor Horn. It satisfies my pop sweet tooth, with a nod to Phil Spector’s “wall of sound” in the bridge. Being a fan of Rod’s voice, I can identify with the longing he portrays in the final chorus, as strains of the instrumental “train” fade away down the track.

But don’t let it be said that I am not a fan of Tom’s version. Nobody does stripped-down, urban angst as he does, playing the eccentric vagrant as no one can; and being a fan of film noir I love the imagery of Tom’s accompanying video (featuring a cameo from the Raging Bull himself, Jake LaMotta). The fact that other artists have covered the song with their own versions speaks to its ability to convey emotion, and being relatable to a wide and varied audience.

And there is no doubt that – good, bad, or indifferent – these various covers of Tom’s original songs have brought the song writer a considerable amount scratch!

“Will I see you tonight
On a downtown train?
All of my dreams just fall like rain
On a downtown train” – Downtown Train (Tom Waits) © Audiam, Inc

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_Train

https://www.songfacts.com/facts/rod-stewart/downtown-train

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Waits

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Pardon Me, Boy

April 27, 2020 /

“Pardon me boy, is that the Chattanooga Choo Choo?
Track twenty nine, boy you can gimme a shine
I can afford to board a Chattanooga Choo Choo
I’ve got my fare and just a trifle to spare” – Chattanooga Choo Choo (Gordon/Warren) © Sony/ATV Music

  • Chief John Ross

The earliest inhabitants of the Chattanooga, Tennessee area were the Native Americans, with Cherokee occupation of the region dating from 1776. John Ross, who eventually became Principal Chief, established Ross’s Landing in 1816, located along what is now Broad Street. It would become a primary center for the Cherokee Nation, which extended into Georgia and Alabama.

In 1838 the U.S. government forced the Cherokee people, along with other Native American tribes, to relocate to the area designated as Indian Territory. The following year the community of Ross’s Landing would be incorporated as the city of Chattanooga.

Being ideally suited for waterborne commerce due to its situation beside the Tennessee River, the city quickly grew. When the railroad arrived in 1850, Chattanooga became a boomtown. The city’s location, where the fertile cotton growing lowlands of the Deep South meet the mountainous region of southern Appalachia, made it a natural gateway between north and south. This distinction would cause Chattanooga to see plenty of action during the American Civil War, when the city proved to be a transportation hub connecting half of the Confederacy’s arsenals.

The First Battle of Chattanooga was fought June 7-8, 1862. It was a minor artillery battle, precipitated when Maj. Gen. Ormsby M. Mitchel ordered Brig. Gen. James Negley, who commanded a small division, to lead an expedition to capture Chattanooga. The Union artillery shelled the city for a day and a half before withdrawing, and although the Confederate losses were minor, it served as a warning that the Union forces could attack deep within the enemy territory at will.

The Second Battle of Chattanooga began on August 21, 1863, when Col. John T. Wilder’s brigade marched to a location northeast of Chattanooga and ordered the 18th Indiana Light Artillery to begin shelling the town. Soldiers and civilians were caught off guard as many were in church observing a day of prayer and fasting. The shelling continued periodically over the next two weeks, allowing the Union army to surround the city to the south and west.

General Grant (l), General Bragg (r)

In the fall of that same year, Union forces withdrew to the city of Chattanooga after the Confederate victory at Chickamauga in September. The Confederate Army under Gen. Braxton Bragg quickly laid siege, cutting off the Federals’ supply lines. After being ordered by President Abraham Lincoln to end the siege at Chattanooga, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant opened the “Cracker Line” across the Tennessee River, allowing the Army of the Cumberland inside the city to be resupplied. In mid-November, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman’s Army of the Tennessee arrived in the city, as well.

General William T. Sherman

From November 23 to November 25, 1863, Union forces fought Confederate troops at the battles of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. The Union victories at these locations drove the rebels back into Georgia. The siege was broken, and the path clear for Gen. Sherman’s march to Atlanta, and ultimately on to Savannah. The vital railroad hub of Chattanooga was securely in Union control and would remain so for the duration of the war.

“You leave the Pennsylvania station ’bout a quarter to four
Read a magazine and then you’re in Baltimore
Dinner in the diner, nothing could be finer
Than to have your ham ‘n’ eggs in Carolina” – Chattanooga Choo Choo (Gordon/Warren)

The reconstruction period following the Civil War found the city of Chattanooga retaining its prominence as a commercial hub, and as the “Gateway to the South”. The post-war decades found railroads rapidly expanding across the country, with the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, desiring a rail link to Southern cities & ports. In order to overcome legal obstacles, the Cincinnati Southern Railway was built with municipal funds and continues to be city-owned to this day, although the city leases its use to Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway (CNO&TP), which is a subsidiary of Norfolk Southern.

Chattanooga Choo Choo © CR Burgan

On May 8, 1880, the first passenger train made the 337 mile trip from Cincinnati to Chattanooga, and the Chattanooga Choo Choo was born. Although the railroad never officially operated a train bearing that name, the “Choo Choo” moniker referred to a small wood burning 2-6-0 type locomotive, which was operated by the Cincinnati Southern, and is now a museum piece.

“When you hear the whistle blowin’ eight to the bar
Then you know that Tennessee is not very far
Shovel all the coal in, gotta keep it rollin’
Woo, woo, Chattanooga, there you are” – Chattanooga Choo Choo (Gordon/Warren)

The Birmingham Special was a passenger train operated jointly by the Southern Railway, Norfolk and Western Railway, and Pennsylvania Railroad. While making a journey upon this train, songwriters Mack Gordon & Harry Warren wrote their hit song, “Chattanooga Choo Choo”. In 1932 the Birmingham Special had been rerouted to include Chattanooga as a stop along its path from Pennsylvania Station in New York City, to Birmingham, Alabama. Although Pennsylvania Station never had a track 29, as the song states, Southern Railway designated the train as #29 in the southbound direction. Along with other references within the song’s lyrics, it’s apparent that the authors were exercising a degree of imagination & artistic license.

On May 7, 1941, Glenn Miller and his Orchestra recorded “Chattanooga Choo Choo” in Hollywood, California, as an extended production number for the 20th Century Fox film Sun Valley Serenade. Several months later it was released on RCA Victor’s Bluebird label as the B-side of a 78 rpm phonograph disc. Featuring the vocals of Tex Beneke, Paula Kelley, and the Modernaires, the song reached #1 on the Billboard Best Sellers chart on December 7, 1941, where it remained for nine weeks. In February 1942 the release was the first to be a certified gold record for sales of 1.2 million units. The song was also nominated for an Academy Award for its appearance in the film. The song’s huge success was deemed to be remarkable considering the fact that due to the ASCAP boycott the song had not been heard on the radio during 1941.

Glenn Miller
  • Tex Beneke
  • Paula Kelley and the Modernaires

In the decades following Glenn Miller’s iconic recording the song has been recorded by dozens of artists, including: Beegie Adair, the Andrews Sisters, Ray Anthony, Asleep at the Wheel, BBC Big Band, George Benson, Regina Carter, Ray Charles, Harry Connick, Jr., Ray Conniff, John Denver, Ernie Fields, Stéphane Grappelli, Susannah McCorkle, Oscar Peterson, Hank Snow, Cab Calloway, Carmen Miranda, Floyd Cramer, Bill Haley and His Comets, Barry Manilow, Herb Alpert, Steve Lucky & the Rhumba Bums, and The Muppets. The song has also been featured in numerous movies and TV shows.

In 1996, Glenn Miller’s original 1941 recording of “Chattanooga Choo Choo” was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

As with many of the songs that I have featured in this blog I gleaned a few new details while researching this recording with which I had felt quite familiar. Learning that the song reached the #1 position on the Billboard charts on what we now call Pearl Harbor Day caused me to reflect on what it meant to folks at the time. The fact that it stayed at #1 for nine weeks tells me that the song was in some way a medicine that helped a grieving population heal from tremendous wounds.

“There’s gonna be a certain party at the station
Satin and lace, I used to call funny face
She’s gonna cry until I tell her that I’ll never roam
So Chattanooga choo choo
Won’t you choo-choo me home?” – Chattanooga Choo Choo (Gordon/Warren)

Sources:

https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/battle-of-chattanooga

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/civil-war/battles/chattanooga

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Chattanoogahttps:

//www.nps.gov/chch/learn/historyculture/battles-for-chattanooga.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chattanooga,_Tennessee

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chattanooga_Choo_Choo

https://www.american-rails.com/chattanooga.html

All photos sourced through internet searches, unless otherwise noted.

Railway Time

April 13, 2020 /

“Well I woke up this morning
And the sun refused to shine
I knew I’d leave my baby
With a troublin’ mind
It rains every morning
And evening is the same
And it’s gonna be a long time
‘Til I hear the 2:10 train” – 2:10 Train (Albertano / Campbell)

Ever since the dawn of human life on this planet brilliant minds have devised methods by which to measure the passage of time: tracking the sun, and other celestial bodies; counting the flow of sand through a narrow neck of glass; water clocks, candle clocks, and time sticks. But all of these practices left room for great variation, and time, or the measure of, was far from uniform.

Iron framed clock at Salisbury Cathedral, UK. Believed to be oldest mechanical clock in the world. From about 1386

Not until the early 14th century did mechanical time keepers appear; followed several hundred years later by the pendulum clock, and with the invention of the mainspring, portable clocks soon evolved into pocket watches.

Workings of an early pendulum clock

But even as the more reliable timekeeping mechanisms of the Industrial Age allowed for the increasingly more accurate measure of time, there was still plenty of room for fluctuation from place to place, and the coming of the railroad introduced an immediate need for time standardization.

“Inside outside, leave me alone
Inside outside, nowhere is home
Inside outside, where have I been?
Out of my brain on the 5:15” – 5:15 (Pete Townshend)

In England, a standardized system known as Railway Time was first adopted by the Great Western Railway in November 1840. This was the first occasion in which local mean times were synchronized to a single standard time. Over the next several years Railway Time was progressively adopted by all the railway companies in Great Britain, and by 1855 the electric telegraph allowed for all stations along all railway lines throughout the country to be synchronized to Greenwich Mean Time.

Prior to the adoption of Railway Time, each town in England would synchronize their local time according to a public clock, usually located in the town square, courthouse, or church. Until the latter part of the 18th century these clocks were set by solar time, using a sundial. Understandably this left room for significant variance in time from town to town.

As travel in that period was often undertaken by foot, by horse, or by carriage, there were plenty of opportunities to make corrections during a journey, which could take many hours, or even days. As the onset of the railways considerably decreased the duration of travel to one’s destination, there was clearly a need to bring local times in line with each other.

While it may be easy for us today to see the sound judgment in having uniform time throughout a country, the railway companies initially encountered resistance in many towns, where it was not uncommon to find two different times displayed and in use. A railway station clock would often show a time that could differ by several minutes from other clocks in town. In spite of the early reluctance, Railway Time was soon adopted by the entire country, although the government did not legislate a single Standard Time and single time zone for Great Britain until 1880.

“I lost everything I had in the ’29 flood
The barn was buried ‘neath a mile of mud
Now I’ve got nothing but the whistle and the steam
My baby’s leaving town on the 2:19” – 2:19 (Brennan/Waits)

In New England, in August of 1853, two trains collided resulting in the death of 14 passengers. The trains were travelling towards each other on the same track, with the collision resulting from the individual train guards having different times set on their watches. Soon railway schedules were coordinated throughout New England, but numerous other accidents led to the need to set up a General Time Convention, which was a committee comprised of railway companies to agree on scheduling.

“I want to ride again
On the 3:10 to Yuma
That’s where I saw my love
The girl with the golden hair” – 3.10 to Yuma (Washington/ Dunning)

At Promontory Point in Utah, on May 10, 1869, a crowd had gathered to witness the driving of the final, ceremonial golden spike, which would join the Union Pacific & Central Pacific Railroads into what would become known as the transcontinental railroad. Telegraph wires had been attached to both the spike, and the maul that would be used to drive it. When the maul struck the spike, that exact moment in time would be transmitted along telegraph lines to those awaiting the news in cities throughout the US.

Gathering at noon, the crowd waited 45 minutes for Leland Stanford to raise the silver maul, and drive the golden spike. The moment was recorded as 12:45 p.m. at Promontory Point, 12:30 p.m. in Virginia City, both 11:44 and 11:46 a.m. in San Francisco, and 2:47 p.m. in Washington D.C.

At the time that the two railroads were joined to form the transcontinental railroad, more than 8,000 towns were using their own local time over 53,000 miles of track that had been laid across the United States.

“Eight-oh-five
I guess you’re leaving soon
I can’t go on without you
Its useless to try

Eight-oh-five
I guess you’re leaving…goodbye” – 8:05 (Laura Anne Stevenson)

In the mid-19th century US, three types of time measurements were used: natural time, local time, and railroad time. Natural time was measured by tracking the movement of the sun throughout the day; local time used synchronized astronomical time, based on the meridian of a specific location; railroad time was kept in the city where the line originated. As railroads expanded and distances increased this practice became cumbersome and difficult to calculate. In the 1860s eighty different timetables were in use in the US, creating a burdensome task for passengers needing to connect between various rail lines.

Cleveland Abbe

Cleveland Abbe, who in 1871 was appointed chief meteorologist at the United States Weather Bureau, subsequently divided the continental United States into four standard time zones, in order to institute a time-keeping system that was consistent between the nation’s weather stations. In 1879 he published a paper titled Report on Standard Time, and in 1883 was successful in convincing the General Time Convention and North American railroad companies to adopt his time-zone system, replacing the 50 different railway times that were then in use.

Surely it would seem the wisdom of this standardized system is self-evident, but there were many smaller towns and cities that were opposed to the adoption of Railway Time. An 1883 report in the Indianapolis Daily Sentinel complained that people would have to “eat, sleep, work … and marry by railroad time”. However, with the support of nearly all railway companies, most cities, and nationally influential scientific institutions, Standard Railway Time was introduced in the United States at noon on November 18, 1883.

Through the ensuing decades Railway Time became a trusted standard, generally accepted as being highly reliable and accurate; departure and arrival times became an embodiment of train lore as much as any other aspect of railroading. Why even bother writing a song about it if you were not fairly certain that your train would be on time?

“5:15, I’m changing trains
This little town, let me down
This foreign rain brings me down

“5:15, train overdue
Angels have gone, no ticket
I’m jumping tracks, I’m changing time” – 5:15 (The Angels Have Gone) David Bowie

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_time

https://railroad.lindahall.org/essays/time-standardization.html

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Hobo climbing onto train

That’s Why I’m Ridin’ the Rails

March 30, 2020 /

“Hoboin’ is my game
B & O’s my middle name
I’m goin’ where that whistle wails
And that’s why I’m ridin’ the rails” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley) © Sire Records

Dick Tracy movie logo

So goes the opening verse of “Ridin’ the Rails”, a song included in the 1990 Warren Beatty directed film, Dick Tracy. Based on the comic strip of the same name which made its debut in the Detroit Mirror in October 1931, the movie is likewise set in the 1930s. Most of the songs included in the film’s soundtrack are styled after the music of that era.

  • k. d. lang
  • Take 6

Though “Ridin’ the Rails” is essentially a novelty tune, and doesn’t appear prominently in the film, I happen to be a fan of the recording and its jazzy tone. I’ve always admired the mellow voice of k. d. lang and the harmonies of Take 6 are impeccable. The video, featuring lang and the vocal group, is highly stylized, with the vocalists’ performances interspersed with clips from the Beatty film.

“Hoboken, New York, PA
60 seconds is all I’ll stay
Keeps me outta county jails
And that’s why I’m ridin’ the rails” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley)

hobos hopping onto a boxcar illustration

Popular culture has greatly romanticized the vagabond tradition of “hopping a freight” to get from one place to another. Although this mode of travel has always been illegal, and inherently dangerous, there remains no shortage of practitioners, even today, when video surveillance, and tightened rail yard security have made surreptitiously climbing aboard a freight train all the more difficult.

Hobo sitting on railroad tracks

Back in the day, when hoboes first began “catching out” on a freight train, there were no other means of transport that offered the chance to travel great distances in short periods of time. Many made the choice to ride the rails out of necessity, while others may have been drawn by the allure of something forbidden, or just as a means of escaping the drudgery of routine life.

“Oh, leave Kentucky
Or the fields of Alabam’
Roomin’ with a box of nails
Or peanuts and yams
Got no next of kin
And there’s no one in my will
Only thing I’m scared of
Is standin’ still” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley)

  • Louis L’Amour
  • George Orwell
  • Woody Guthrie

Many notable figures of popular culture spent time riding the rails while engaging in the hobo way of life. This list includes Louis L’Amour, George Orwell, Carl Sandburg, Woody Guthrie, Robert Mitchum, and Jack Kerouac, to name a few. Jack London, who spent 30 days in jail in New York for vagrancy, and accompanied Kelly’s Army across the country, wrote about his hobo experiences in his short memoir, The Road.

The Road, by Jack London (book cover)

As to his reasons for choosing to pursue the transient lifestyle of the bindle-stiff, or “stiff”, as London calls them, he writes in The Road:

“Every once in a while, in newspapers, magazines, and biographical dictionaries, I run upon sketches of my life, wherein, delicately phrased, I learn that it was in order to study sociology that I became a tramp. This is very nice and thoughtful of the biographers, but it is inaccurate. I became a tramp – well, because of the life that was in me, of the wanderlust in my blood that would not let me rest. Sociology was merely incidental; it came afterward, in the same manner, that a wet skin follows a ducking. I went on ‘The Road’ because I couldn’t keep away from it; because I hadn’t the price of the railroad fare in my jeans; because I was so made that I couldn’t work all my life on ‘one same shift’; because – well, just because it was easier to than not to.”

London is clear in expressing that just getting from one place to another is not always the primary inducement to riding the rails.

Jack London
Jack London

“I’ll ride ’til I’m dead
Boxcar’s my only bed
That’s home when all else fails
That’s why I’m ridin’ the rails” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley)

Riding Toward Everywhere, by William T. Vollman (book cover)

Author, William T. Vollman, in his train-hopping paean, Riding Toward Everywhere, details his experiences with “catching out”, sometimes alone, sometimes with his more experienced friend, Steve. His is a modern commentary on the hobo traditions, where security is tighter, and the trains move considerably faster than in days of old. Some notable quotes from Vollman’s book:

“Freight train rides are parables”

“On the iron horse, I can experience the state of unlimited expansion”

“I saw it, and then it was gone”

“ . . . we clickety-clacked away into our dreams”

“More hours went by, as empty as the tracks themselves”

“’Someone’s hiding’, he chuckled, like a wicked giant in a fairy tale” (while hiding in the darkness from a yard “bull”)

“I am free and for some indefinite period, which while it lasts is as good as forever, my own sad life, with its rules, necessities and railroad bulls, will not be able to catch me”

“When we reached the head locomotive we saw that it was dark; the engineer must have gone home long since; our decision to leave this cold train was thus proven to be in the same spirit of prudence which is manifested by the lice that leave a corpse. What proud parasites we were!”

Vollman also laments that riding the rails is not as easy as it once was – “The technology is changing, so there are fewer boxcars and more container cars,” he says. “Everything is ridable to an expert, but . . . there are no experts.”

William T. Vollman
William T. Vollman

“Brushfire Billy
And his buddies, Ned and Slim
Nine years back in Provo
Was the last I saw of him
Brakeman, leave me be
Let this hobo rest his bones
Sleep will overtake me
When that diesel moans” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley)

Hobo, by Eddy Joe Cotton (book cover)

Eddy Joe Cotton (real name Zebu Recchia) is an author, hobo poet, and ringleader of the Yard Dogs Road Show. As a nineteen-year-old, he set out tramping from his father’s home in Denver, Colorado. He details his freight hopping experiences in his bestselling book, Hobo: A Young Man’s Thoughts on Trains and Tramping in America. Though the world of tramps & hoboes is most often dirty, seedy & coarse, all of which is reflected in his memoir, Cotton renders his tales in a decidedly poetic tone:

“In the silence between trains, you can hear your toes wiggle in your boots. I had gone a thousand miles on one pair of socks. There was a turkey vulture up in the air, looking for ghosts. On the hills where the tracks disappeared a cold rain fell like needles and the hidden sun glowed silver through the broken clouds. I lay back on my bedroll and closed my eyes”

“Black diesel billowed up from the head end of the train. There were four monster locomotives up there, pulling boxcars like sled dogs and coughing smoke out of their big diesel smoke-stacks. The bark of those diesel engines held the cry of a million pistons and cracked the silence in the Wyoming prairie apart”

“I rolled up in my poncho, lay down on the floor of the car, and watched rusty paint flakes dance in the corner. I daydreamed of carefree America: casino coffee . . . white motel sheets, showers with soap, and shingled roofs. I knew that when those foothills ate the sun our boxcar would freeze solid again, and there wasn’t a thing I could do about it”

“In this business of tramping, it’s impossible to hold onto anybody or anything, and as a result, I have become a lonely man”

Eddy Joe Cotton
Eddy Joe Cotton

“That country’s long and wide
The Santa Fe’s my bride
I’ll hop her when she sails
That’s why I’m ridin’ the rails” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley)

hoboes climbing on a train

Pete Aadland, executive director of the rail safety charity California Operation Lifeline that promotes safety on the rails, dismisses the notion that train hopping today provides an authentically American experience or any real connection with the spirit of the 1930s.

“There was no work, there was no food, so tens of thousands of men would use the railroads to get to where they could, maybe find a job,” he says.

“That lure, I think, probably remains today. But I would say that it’s not romantic, it’s illegal and it’s dangerous.

“Losing limbs is very common,” he says. “Loads can shift when you’re inside of a car. Doors can close and lock – you starve and die of thirst.”

And yet, as long as there are trains rollin’ down a track to some destination somewhere, and as long as there are dreamers longing for an adventure, surely there will be hoboes & tramps riding the rails to . . . . .

Wherever

hobo with guitar case, climbing from a boxcar

“I’m ridin’, I’m slidin’
I won’t last too long
Got a bandana and a whistle for a song
There ain’t no wheels on the floor of a jail
That’s why I’m ridin’ the rails” – Ridin’ the Rails (N. Claflin/ A. Paley) © Sire Records

Sources:

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-20756990

The Road, by Jack London

Riding Toward Everywhere, by William T. Vollman

Hobo, by Eddy Joe Cotton

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Pullman Porter Blues

March 16, 2020 /

“I feel oh, so blue
I really don’t know what to do
I got a brand new job: a tip collector
It’s some job: a car protector” – Pullman Porter Blues (Clifford Ulrich & Burton Hamilton) © Leo Feist, Inc.

Lee Wesley Gibson, 100 yrs old (2010)

On June 29, 2016, the Los Angeles Times reported that Lee Wesley Gibson, a resident of Los Angeles, had “died as he lived – calm, quiet and in control – sitting in a chair at home . . . with family members at his side”. He was 106 years old. What caught my attention in this article was that it was believed that Mr. Gibson was the oldest surviving Pullman porter.

Lee Gibson was born in Keatchie, Louisiana in 1910; married Beatrice Woods – his wife of 76 years – in 1927; and in 1935, during the height of the Great Depression, moved his family to Los Angeles, in search of greater opportunities.

In 1936, a deacon at Gibson’s church who worked for the Union Pacific Railroad as a coach attendant asked his wife Beatrice if her husband would be interested in a job with the railroad. In a 2010 interview with the Times on the occasion of his 100th birthday, Mr. Gibson recalled that this was a golden opportunity.

Mr. Gibson began working for the Union Pacific as a coach attendant, later being promoted to Pullman porter. Porters were the uniformed railway men serving the first-class passengers who travelled in the Pullman Company’s luxurious sleeping cars. It was a sought after position, allowing a certain amount of prestige for African Americans that was difficult to find in other vocations. Having steady work, Mr. Gibson was able to buy a brand-new home for his family in 1945; a home in which he lived until his death.

Pullman Porters

“It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, draft on my feet’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, turn on the heat’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter’, all the live long day
‘Pullman Porter, bring me water’, that’s all they say

“It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, make up my berth’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter’, no peace on Earth
‘Oh, Pullman Porter, won’t you shine my shoes’
I got the Pullman Porter blues” – Pullman Porter Blues (Ulrich/Hamilton)

George Pullman founded the Pullman Car Company in 1862. It is said that after spending a night sleeping upright in his seat during a train trip through New York, Mr. Pullman had the idea to design a rail car that contained sleeper berths for every passenger. Although the first cars manufactured included somewhat spartan sleeping arrangements, within a short period of time the company was turning out luxury sleeping cars which featured carpeting, draperies, upholstered chairs, libraries, and card tables. Besides the unparalleled quality of the Pullman car’s accommodations, they became known for the impeccable service provided by the company’s staff of Pullman Porters.

The Pullman Car Company not only built the eponymous rail cars, they also owned & operated them along the nation’s railways. Soon after the American Civil War, George Pullman began seeking out former slaves to staff his sleeping cars. Aware that most Americans did not have servants in their homes, Pullman understood that by allowing passengers to be served by a liveried waiter or butler, he could provide the growing middle class with something they had never before experienced.

In the mid 1920s, during its peak of operations, the Pullman Company’s fleet grew to number 9,800 sleeping cars, staffed by 12,000 porters. A porter was expected to greet passengers, carry baggage, make up the sleeping berths, serve food and drinks brought from the dining car, send & receive telegrams, shine shoes, provide valet service, and keep the cars neat and orderly.

A porter was expected to be available both day & night. The job could be demeaning, and many were subjected to discrimination and abuse. Early on many porters were obligated to answer to the name “George”, as if they were George Pullman’s personal servant; a practice that grew out of slaves often being named after their owner.

Although wages were low, in an era with limited opportunities for African American men, being a Pullman porter was one of the best jobs available. Not being offered a livable wage, porters relied heavily on the tips that they received from passengers. Walter Biggs, son of a Pullman porter, shared memories of being a Pullman porter as told to him by his father:

Jackie Gleason

“One of the most remarkable stories I liked hearing about was how when Jackie Gleason would ride … all the porters wanted to be on that run. The reason why? Not only because he gave every porter $100.00, but it was just the fun, the excitement, the respect that he gave the porters. Instead of their names being George, he called everybody by their first name. He always had like a piano in the car and they sang and danced and had a great time. He was just a fun person to be around.”

In an effort to improve working conditions and wages, A. Philip Randolph began organizing the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in 1925. Under Randolph’s leadership, the first black union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, was formed. These unionizing efforts were also crucial in laying the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement, as labor organizer and former Pullman porter E. D. Nixon was instrumental in organizing the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Alabama in 1955, and was also responsible for bailing Rosa Parks out of jail when she refused to give up her seat on the bus.

“It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, turn on the light’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, get me a bite’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter’ all the whole night thru
It seems to me I’m always wrong, whatever I do

“It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, what town are we at?’
It’s, ‘Pullman Porter, brush off my hat’
‘Now look here, Porter, someone stole my booze’
I got the Pullman Porter blues” – Pullman Porter Blues (Ulrich/Hamilton)

The Pullman Company would eventually become the largest single employer of blacks in America. Many people credit porters as being significant contributors to the development of America’s black middle class. Black historian and civil-rights activist Timuel Black observed in a 2013 interview:

“[The Pullman porters] were good looking, clean and immaculate in their dress. Their style was quite manly; their language was carefully crafted, so that they had a sense of intelligence about them. They were good role models for young men. . . . [B]eing a Pullman porter was a prestigious position because it offered a steady income and an opportunity to travel across the country, which was rare for blacks at that time.”

  • Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
  • Pullman Porters

Lyn Hughes, founder of the A. Philip Randolph Pullman Porter Museum in Chicago, which celebrates the contribution of African Americans to the nation’s labor history, states, “For African Americans, it was a middle-class job. It represented a sort of freedom, flexibility and education all in one bundle.”

  • Thurgood Marshall
  • Willie Brown
  • Malcolm X

Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, a former porter himself, was also a descendant of a Pullman porter, as was former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. Malcolm X and photojournalist Gordon Parks were both employed as porters.

“I make their berths up, give ‘em sheets
And put ‘em all to bed
And when they’re feeling bad
Get Bromo Seltzer for their head

“I get’em soap, I get ‘em towels
And even comb their hair
Say, when it comes to giving service
Boss, I am a bear” – Pullman Porter Blues (Ulrich/Hamilton)

Lee Gibson worked on the railroad for 38 yrs. When the Pullman Co. ceased operation of sleeping cars in 1968, Pullman porters were transferred to Union Pacific, and later Amtrak. He retired from the railroad in 1974. In his LA Times interview of 2010 he spoke of rubbing shoulders with celebrities such as bandleader Duke Ellington, jazz singer Cab Calloway, and trumpeter Louis Armstrong, who Gibson recalled was always friendly and willing to talk.

  • Duke Ellington
  • Cab Calloway
  • Louis Armstrong

“He (Armstrong) played Vegas and would catch my train from Vegas many times,” Gibson said. “He was quite interesting.”

Although porters sometimes had to endure humiliation and racism, Gibson says he was always treated with respect; said Gibson of his career serving others on the railroad, “It was hard, but it was fun.”

“I got the Pullman Porter blues” – Pullman Porter Blues (Ulrich/Hamilton)

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Company

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_porter

https://www.latimes.com/

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

A Train Can’t Bring Me Home

March 2, 2020 /

“Well I broke down in East St. Louis, on the Kansas City line
Drunk up all my money that I borrowed every time
And I fell down at the derby, the night’s black as a crow
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Thomas A. Waits) © Audiam, Inc

In the late 1980s – early 1990s I was working a job in the Coachella Valley of Southern California. My place of employment was almost exactly 50 miles from my home. Having been given by a friend a homemade cassette tape that included Tom Waits’ Small Change on one side, and Swordfish Trombones on the other, I had discovered that if I began the Small Change (total length of album: 48 min, 29 sec) side of the tape just as I was departing work, the album’s final song, “I Can’t Wait to Get Off Work”, would be playing as I entered my driveway and parked in front of my garage. This soon became a weekly ritual for me; my “TGIF” celebration as I drove home, paycheck in hand, leaving my job and workweek behind for a couple of days.

Small Change was Tom Waits’ third studio album. Recorded direct to two-track stereo tape in July 1976, and released later that same year, the album’s eleven tracks featured some of Waits’ best lyrical work to date. With Waits on piano and vocals, the album included the talents of Shelly Manne on drums, Jim Hughart on bass, and some delectable tenor saxophone work from the legendary Lew Tabackin. Along with a number of brilliant string arrangements by Jerry Yester, the release has been described as “beatnik-glory-meets-Hollywood-noir”.

Even someone with only a passing familiarity with the music of Tom Waits would likely agree that he is not the easiest of artists to sing along with. I’ve learned that for me the pursuit typically results in a sore throat. So, my Friday afternoon drive time was spent listening to Tom’s philosophical ruminations of urban life’s seamier side, as I contemplated my impending weekend. It wasn’t long before my weekly immersion in Small Change, led me to wade deeper into Waits’ catalog of recordings.

Tom Waits

Although Small Change doesn’t really include any direct references to trains, it didn’t take long for me to recognize that trains & rail travel are familiar imagery in Tom Waits’ lyrical compositions. Not only has he penned songs dealing specifically with trains (e.g., “Train Song”, “Downtown Train”, “2:19”), but many of his songs include one or more lines referring to trains and/or traveling by rail.

In fact, further sleuthing led to an internet site listing more than 40 of Waits’ songs that contain references to trains, including:

“I come into town on a night train with an arm full of boxcar/ On the wings of a magpie cross a hooligan night” – Whistlin’ Past the Graveyard (Blue Valentine)

“Just put a church key in your pocket we’ll hop that freight train in the hall / We’ll slide all the way down the drain to New Orleans in the fall” – Kentucky Avenue (Blue Valentine)

“He went down, down, down and the devil called him by name / He went down, down, down hangin’ onto the back of a train” – Down, Down, Down (Swordfish Trombones)

“And they all pretend they’re Orphans and their memory’s like a train / You can see it getting smaller as it pulls away” – Time (Rain Dogs)

“I lived on nothing but dreams and train smoke” – Pony (Mule Variations)

Trains have been featured in popular music for as long as trains have existed. Sometimes the reference is literal, but often the train is used in a metaphorical sense. Train travel can signify deliverance, or transportation to a better life. The depiction of a locomotive barreling under a full head of steam may suggest loss of control. And there is likely no confusion what the railroad term “sidetracked” implies when used as a figure of speech.

Train imagery can also indicate transience. A quick perusal of Tom Waits’ life may find evidence of a significant amount of roving, and plainly his songs are populated by vagabonds and wanderers, whether autobiographical or otherwise. Waits once stated, “I don’t like the stigma that comes with being called a poet– so I call what I’m doing an improvisational adventure or an inebriational travelogue, and all of a sudden it takes on a whole new form and meaning”.

“What made my dreams so hollow, was standing at the depot
With a steeple full of swallows that could never ring the bell
And I’ve come ten thousand miles away, not one thing to show
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Waits)

“A steeple full of swallows that could never ring the bell”, is a favorite line from Waits’ “Train Song”.

The song appears on his ninth studio album, Frank’s Wild Years, which is a collection of songs written for a play of the same name, and released in 1987. Waits starred as the eponymous lead character, Frank, for a three-month period in 1985, when the play was produced by Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theater Company.

Steppenwolf Theater Company, Deerfield

While I’m not absolutely clear on the play’s plot, “Train Song” appears near the end of the album’s side two, which makes the song’s final repeated line, “It was a train that took me away from here/ But a train can’t bring me home”, somewhat telling.

Many of Tom Waits’ songs – diehard fans may consider this blasphemy – often sound better when recorded by other artists. That being said, my favorite recording of “Train Song” is a live rendition by Canadian singer Holly Cole, recorded in Montreal and released on Cole’s 1996 album, It Happened One Night. Guitarist Kevin Breit uses his instrument to create train sound effects that, along with David Piltch’s throbbing bass and the spare percussion parts, lend Waits’ classic train song a haunting, ethereal quality.

Not that Tom’s version of the song doesn’t possess a haunting and ethereal quality of its own. It absolutely does, and I would not take anything away from his original recording. But as a lover of music and song, I appreciate being able to enjoy further interpretations of an artist’s work. On that subject, I believe that I will in a future blog post, shine the spotlight on another of Waits’ train songs, recorded by a number of different artists.

Until then . . .

“I remember when I left without bothering to pack
Don’t you know I up and left with just the clothes I had on my back
Now I’m sorry for what I’ve done and I’m out here on my own
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Waits)

Sources:

http://www.tomwaitsfan.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8993

http://www.tomwaits.com/wit/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Waits

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franks_Wild_Years

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Change_(Tom_Waits_album)

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

You Can’t Cheat Mother Nature

February 17, 2020 /

“In an era of dissension
On a bleak mid-winter morn
There stood a house divided
By righteous indignation borne” – Chunky Creek (Train Wreck of 1863) © C. R. Burgan, Jr. / BMI

The winter of 1862 – 63 saw a number of attempts by the Union army to wrest control of the city of Vicksburg, Mississippi from the Confederates. The city had become a fortress for the Confederate States, allowing the South to control the southern portion of the Mississippi River, as far as Port Hudson, in Louisiana. The city’s natural riverside defenses were perfect, earning it the nickname, “The Gibraltar of the Confederacy”. Located high on a bluff overlooking a horseshoe-shaped bend in the river, Vicksburg was almost impossible to approach by ship.

With the city of Memphis having fallen to Union forces the previous summer, the strategic importance of maintaining control of the lower Mississippi River could not be overstated. President Jefferson Davis had declared, “Vicksburg is the nail head that holds the South’s two halves together.”

  • Jefferson Davis
  • President Lincoln with troops

The Union also understood the significance that control of the Mississippi represented to the Confederacy in maintaining a supply line with their states on the western side of the river. In Washington President Abraham Lincoln had written, “Vicksburg is the key. …The war can never be brought to a close until that key is in our pocket”.

Admiral David Farragut, US Navy

Vicksburg had been under Union attack previously, when in the spring of 1862 Admiral David Farragut traveled upriver after his capture of New Orleans. Demanding the surrender of the city, but lacking sufficient troops to force compliance, he returned to New Orleans. Likewise Union naval attacks arriving from the north had also failed due to the gunboats being unable to approach the city while remaining out of reach of Confederate gun emplacements upon the bluff.

Realizing the impregnable nature of the city’s riverside defenses, the Union soon commenced an overland campaign to attack Vicksburg from the east.

  • General Ulysses S Grant, US Army
  • General John C Pemberton, Confederate Army

Defending the city of Vicksburg, Lt. General John C. Pemberton commanded what historian John D. Winters described as “a beaten and demoralized army, fresh from the defeat at Corinth, Mississippi”. If there was any hope of holding the city against General Ulysses S. Grant and the Army of the Tennessee, which would eventually grow to number 75,000 men, Gen. Pemberton would need men, supplies, and currency.

“The driver gave the order
‘Stoke that fire in the belly of the beast!’
With his consignment of souls, supplies & cash
He set out from the east” – Chunky Creek © C. R. Burgan, Jr.

In the early morning hours of February 19, 1863, a train carrying Confederate soldiers and some civilians departed from Meridian, Mississippi, bound for Vicksburg. Along with the passengers the train also carried supplies and a large amount of cash. Due to the battles being waged in the Union’s campaign for control of the river port, there was a great urgency to receive the train and its manifest.

The consist was led by an American 4-4-0 type locomotive known as Hercules; the engineer was Isaiah P. Beauchamp. Prior to the war both locomotive and driver had been based in New Orleans, Louisiana. On this date Hercules was pulling a tender and four cars, with 100 passengers aboard.

For months the region had been experiencing heavy rains which had caused the Chunky River to flood repeatedly. Each successive flooding brought more debris downriver, much of it coming to rest against the wooden pilings and trestles of the Southern Rail Road bridge that spanned the waterway.

The Southern Rail Road had acquired a reputation for having one of the least well-maintained trackages in the country. The Daily Southern Crisis, a newspaper in Jackson, reported that accidents on the line were a common occurrence.

A train had crossed the Chunky bridge a day ahead of the Hercules, but only after all the passengers had been removed from the train, with the train proceeding to slowly cross over the swollen river. It is believed that this train crossing may have caused the bridge to shift, settling to as much as 6 inches out of alignment with the rails on the eastern side of the span. Efforts were made to repair the bridge, but there was not an adequate crew to perform the work before the next train was due.

Absalom F. Temple was the section master for an approximately 8 mile section of railway that included the bridge over the Chunky River. On the day preceding Hercules‘ run he had been at the bridge four separate times, attempting to clear debris. Noticing that one of the bridge’s supports had come loose, and the bridge had begun to sag downstream, he asked another railroad employee to make sure the train departing Meridian early the next morning was held up and not allowed to cross the bridge.

Temple’s account was printed in The Daily Southern Crisis:

“ . . . I told him to be sure and keep a negro there for the purpose. I then dug a hole in the middle of the track and put up a thick pole about as near as I could tell 150 yards from the bridge. This is the usual method of stopping trains when danger is ahead . . . The next morning I had the hands up before daylight, and was just going out on the road to work . . . Just as I started out I met a man running up the road with the news of the accident”.

“Scoured from the landscape
And hastened by the flood
The detritus of a region swirled and mixed
With sweat and blood

“Pilings yielded to the pressure
The Chunky’s span no longer true
And the Mississippi Southern plunged into the flow
In its effort to push on through” – Chunky Creek © C. R. Burgan, Jr.

Hercules ran off the track as it entered the bridge, becoming completely submerged in the icy cold water. The tender and trailing cars landed on top of the locomotive, with the wooden cars being nearly demolished by the impact. Barrels and boxes were later found floating downstream.

The Athens Post, a newspaper based in Athens, Tennessee printed the following report:

“A man just in from Chunkey (sic) says the engine and five cars are under water.— the conductor is hurt, but swam out.—The engineer has not been heard from. Between twenty-five and fifty persons are supposed to be lost—mostly soldiers . . . The third and fifth cars had only troops and one horse—about seventy men in the two. The engineer was forward on the engine looking out, and the conductor was on the engine.”

“With brazen disregard for self
Dark schemes to circumvent
Came brave delivering angels
Most surely heaven sent” – Chunky Creek © C. R. Burgan, Jr.

Jack Amos, of the First Battalion of Choctaw Indians

Camped near the crash site happened to be a newly formed regiment, the 1st Battalion of Choctaw Indians. Hearing the commotion the soldiers rushed to the riverside, stripped down and immediately jumped into the water and began removing bodies. Samuel G. Spann, a captain at the time later reported in a magazine article that “ninety-six bodies were brought out upon a prominent strip of land above the waterline. Twenty-two were resuscitated . . . and all the balance were crudely interred upon the railroad right of way, where they now lie in full view of the passing train

Memorial wreath laid near the crash site

“The ultimate tribute offered
The utmost price was paid
Now their silent mortal vessels
Along the right of way are laid” – Chunky Creek © C. R. Burgan, Jr.

Most of those that perished were either killed by the initial impact or trapped underwater beneath the wreckage. Of the one hundred passengers on the train, seventy-five were perished, including the engineer, who had been trapped within the locomotive. A small number of the bodies were eventually disinterred by family or friends, but some remains were unable to be located due to the crude manner in which they were originally buried. A marker has been placed at the site to commemorate those whose lives were lost in the wreck.

I came upon an accounting of this incident inadvertantly, and believing that the story of the train wreck was little known I set upon telling it in my own way. While some artistic license was taken, I hope that I have been faithful to the details, and the memory of those whose lives were lost.

“You can’t cheat Mother Nature
Of the toll that she demands
The blood will let as you place your bet
And you leave it in the devil’s hands

And where the wheel stops turning
Only the Maker knows . . .
The muddy river flows” – Chunky Creek © C. R. Burgan, Jr.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Vicksburg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Port_Hudson

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicksburg_campaign

https://www.nchgs.org/html/train_wreck_1863.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chunky_Creek_Train_Wreck

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Bring in the Workers and Bring Up the Rails

February 3, 2020 /

”There was a time in this fair land when the railroad did not run
 When the wild majestic mountains stood alone against the sun
 Long before the white man and long before the wheel
 When the green dark forest was too silent to be real”  – Canadian Railroad Trilogy (Lightfoot) © Warner/Chappell Music

Gordon Meredith Lightfoot Jr. was born November 17, 1938, in Orillia, Ontario, Canada, to Gordon Lightfoot, Sr, and Jessie Vick Trill Lightfoot. Recognizing Gordon’s musical talent at an early age, his mother schooled him into a successful young singer, performing with various choral groups at local festivals. Winning a vocal competition at the age of twelve, he made his first performance at Massy Hall in Toronto.

In his teenage years Lightfoot learned piano, and taught himself how to play drums & percussion, as well as folk guitar. He has stated that a formative influence for him during this period was 19th-century American songwriter Stephen Foster. His athletic abilities as an accomplished track-and-field competitor, as well as his scholastic aptitude, helped him earn entrance to McGill University’s Schulich School of Music and the University of Toronto, Faculty of Music.

In his early 20s Lightfoot moved to California, where he spent two years studying jazz composition and orchestration at Hollywood’s Westlake College of Music. While there he supported himself by singing on demo recordings and writing, arranging, and producing commercial jingles. But missing Canada, Lightfoot returned to Toronto in 1960.

  • Pete Seeger
  • Ian and Sylvia
  • The Weavers

Now influenced by the folk music of Pete Seeger, Bob Gibson, Ian and Sylvia Tyson, and The Weavers, Lightfoot began performing with various groups, soon making a name for himself on the Toronto folk music circuit.

Lightfoot traveled in Europe and the United Kingdom, where for one year he hosted BBC TV’s Country and Western Show. Returning to Canada in 1964, he began earning a reputation as a songwriter. Ian and Sylvia Tyson recorded Lightfoot’s tunes, “Early Morning Rain” and “For Lovin’ Me”; a year later both songs were recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary; other performers would eventually record one or both of these songs, including Elvis Presley, Chad & Jeremy, George Hamilton IV, The Clancy Brothers, and the Johnny Mann Singers.

In 1965 Lightfoot signed a management deal with Albert Grossman, who managed Bob Dylan, Peter Paul & Mary, as well as other notable folk acts. Also signing a recording deal with United Artists, he released his debut album, Lightfoot!, in 1966.

Bob Dylan & Gordon Lightfoot

“For they looked in the future and what did they see
 They saw an iron road runnin’ from thesea to the sea
 Bringin’ the goods to a young growin’ land
 All up from the seaports and into their hands”  – Canadian Railroad Trilogy (Lightfoot)

To kick off the celebration of Canada’s centennial year, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation commissioned Gordon Lightfoot to write “Canadian Railroad Trilogy”, as part of a special broadcast scheduled for January 1, 1967. The song, written over a period of three days, describes the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway in the early 1880s.

The Canadian Pacific Railway was incorporated in 1881. It was Canada’s first transcontinental railroad. Built between 1881 and 1885, it connected eastern Canada with British Columbia. Now primarily a freight hauling railway, it was for decades the only reliable means of passenger travel to remote areas of Canada’s western provinces, and played a significant role in the development of that region.

Lightfoot’s song documents the ambitions and optimism of a young nation, eager to connect its individual provinces with a means to flourish with the anticipated prosperity of a dawning industrial age. He sings of a vast majestic and verdant land, soon to be tamed by men with steel hammers; soon to be bound by iron rails. The song was written with three distinct sections: a slow & poignant middle section, framed by more strident & faster paced sections at the beginning & end. Mimicking a locomotive as it slowly builds up a head of steam, the first section of the song gradually increases in tempo. Once again, after the measured pace of the middle section, the locomotive gains steam as it highballs toward the song’s reflective finale.

Of his now classic composition, Lightfoot has remarked: I played it for the CBC guy live at his desk before I recorded it. This was part of a two-hour special that was played on New Year’s afternoon. I got the idea to write it long from a mentor of mine named Bob Gibson, who is a major figure in the folk revival. He had written a song called “Civil War Trilogy,” which had a slow part in the middle, and I followed that pattern. Without a piece of input like that, I probably wouldn’t have been able to approach the song on that basis. The song says a lot. Canadian author Pierre Berton said to me, “You know, Gord, you said as much in that song as I said in my book [about the building of the railroad across Canada].” I appreciated the compliment.

Lightfoot has also mentioned a list of about nine of his songs which he always includes in his live performances, with “Canadian Railroad Trilogy” being among those songs.

When I asked my older brother Randy – the most avid Gordon Lightfoot fan I know – for some insights about “Trilogy”, he remarked on Gordon’s storytelling-style of songwriting. This led me to reflect on the bards of yore, whose fame originated from their tradition of oral storytelling, the ability to recount epic tales poetically in rhythm & rhyme as an intrinsic element of their societal culture. Clearly this is a songwriting style that Gordon Lightfoot has mastered, and inspired in others. Several years ago I set about writing a song to tell the story of a Civil War train wreck, and immediately I considered how Lightfoot, in his own song, had recounted the story of the shipwreck of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald; certainly a model worth referencing.

Gordon Lightfoot rerecorded “Canadian Railroad Trilogy” with full orchestration for his 1975 compilation album, Gord’s Gold; live versions appear on two of his live album releases. The song has been covered by John Mellencamp and George Hamilton IV, among others, with James Keelaghan performing the song on the Lightfoot tribute album, Beautiful. In an interview with The Telegraph, Lightfoot indicated that upon meeting Queen Elizabeth II, she had told how him much she enjoyed the song. 

“Drivin’ ’em in and tyin’ ’em down
  Away to the bunkhouse and into the town
  A dollar a day and a place for my head
  A drink to the livin’ and a toast to the dead”          – Canadian Railroad Trilogy  

While compiling material for this post I listened to “Canadian Railroad Trilogy” on YouTube numerous times. As I scrolled through the comments that had been posted there I was struck by the impact this song has had on many listeners and felt compelled to include a few:

Strapper Nick – I’m sure this tune has extra special meaning to Gordon’s fellow native Canadians, but I’m an American who loves it just as much.  It’s my favorite Lightfoot song and I never tire of listening to it.  It just stays in my head.

David Nyro – I’m not Canadian but the very moment I heard this song, a young man in college, it touched my soul. Yes, it’s proudly Canadian, but I think it’s universal. It touches on the mythic and the yearning of any new country.

Craig Perry – History never sounded so good and interesting until sung by Gord !

Jerry – I NEVER get tired of this incredible classic!!!

“Oh the song of the future has been sung
 All the battles have been won
 O’er the mountain tops, we stand
 All the world at our command
 We have opened up the soil
 With our teardrops and our toil”    – Canadian Railroad Trilogy  

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Railroad_Trilogy

http://gordonlightfoot.com/songbookcommentsabouthissongs.shtml

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Lightfoot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Pacific_Railway

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

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