Railroad Links
by William Eric McFadden

revision 08152009-1611

Table of Contents
Links to sites not related to railroads can be found in my Bookmarks.

Read my disclaimer.


"I like the late night sound of the train, clunking down the tracks, through the distant air the scream of its whistle changing pitches as it passes from one somewhere to another who-knows-where. It makes me feel like a boy again." -- Wynton Marsalis

"To anyone outside, a speeding train is a thunderbolt of driving rods, a hot hiss of steam, a blurred flash of coaches, a wall of movement and of noise, a shriek, a wail, and then just emptiness and absence, with a feeling of 'There goes everybody!' without knowing who anybody is... And all of a sudden the watcher feels the vastness and loneliness of America, and the nothingness of all those little lives hurled past upon the immensity of the continent. But if one is inside the train, everything is different." -- Thomas Wolfe


Railroad Magazines (return to top)
Trains.com with Trains and Classic Trains magazines
CTC Board Railroads Illustrated--new URL
Railfan and Railroad Magazine
Railpace Newsmagazine
Eastern Railroad News

Let's Talk Trains Internet Radio

Railfan Guides (return to top)
An Article on Railfanning in the Age of Terrorism (and the related thread at Photo.net)
November 15, 2002 audio story at NPR: Trouble for Trainspotters

Frograil Railfan Locations and Self-guided Tours

Ohio
West Virginia
Kentucky
Tennessee
North Carolina

Altoona and the Horseshoe Curve:

Horseshoe Curve Chapter of NRHS with Railfan's Guide to Altoona
Horseshow Curve by the Railroaders Heritage Corporation
Railfanning the PRR: Altoona, PA
Railfanning the PRR's West Slope
Gallitzin Tunnels Park & Museum

Ohio Railroad Page by Don Narris--"dedicated to Ohio railroads, past and present"
Railroads of Ohio by Brian Minnich, with information about all the railroads in Ohio
Northern West Virginia's Railroads by Matt Reese and Chris Strogen
Phil's Railroading Page--the "Railfan's guide to CSX's Baltimore Division"
B&O RR Photo Tours in and around Maryland by Steve Okonski
Railfan Guide to Saluda Grade by Bob Loehne; gone?
Saluda Grade by Robin Michael
Springfield (Ohio) Railroads by Shawn Vermillion
Allan Gartner's guide to the Clinchfield Railroad

articles at Trains.com:

Train-Watching Basics
Railroad Radio Communications

NSLakeDivisionRailfans forum on Yahoo!, dedicated to the Lake and Dearborn Divisions of the NS

Tourist Shortlines, Museums, and Historical Societies (return to top)
Ashtabula, Carson, & Jefferson Railway, Ashtabula, Ohio
B&O Railroad Museum & Willard Area Historical Society, Willard, Ohio
Zanesville & Western Scenic Railroad, formerly the Buckeye Central Scenic RR
Byesville Scenic Railway, Byesville, Ohio

The Cincinnati Railroad Club

SummeRail at Cincinnati Union Terminal--August 11, 2007

The Cincinnati Railway Company, Cincinnati, Ohio
Connotton Valley Railway, Bedford, Ohio
Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad, northeast Ohio
Dennison Railroad Museum, Dennison, Ohio
Harrod Railroad Park, Harrod, Ohio
The Hocking Valley Scenic Railroad, Nelsonville, Ohio
Jefferson Depot Village, Jefferson, Ohio
Lorain & West Virginia Railway, Wellington, Ohio
Mad River & NKP Railroad Museum, Bellevue, Ohio
Midwest Railway Preservation Society, Cleveland, Ohio
Minerva Scenic Railway, Minerva, Ohio
Northern Ohio Railway Museum, Chippewa Lake, Ohio

The Ohio Central Railroad

Excursions page
commercial rail site
TrainFest 2004 July 30-Aug 1, 2004

Ohio Railway Museum, Worthington, Ohio
Orville Railroad Heritage Society, Orville, Ohio
Toledo, Lake Erie, & Western Railway, Waterville, Ohio
STEAM Railroad Museum, Minerva, Ohio
Trolleyville, USA, Olmstead, Ohio
Turtle Creek & Lebanon Railway, part of The Cincinnati Railway Co.; Lebanon, Ohio
Warther Carvings, Dover, Ohio

The Bluegrass Railroad Museum, Versailles, Kentucky
Kentucky Railway Museum, New Haven, Kentucky

Great Smoky Mountains Railroad, Dillsboro & Bryson City, NC

Western Maryland Scenic Railroad, Cumberland, Maryland

The Chesapeake and Ohio Historical Society and the Chessie Shop
Collis P. Huntington RRHS
The Chessie System Historical Society
Norfolk Southern S Historical Society and Discussion Forum
The official Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Museum page
Wes Barris' Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Musuem page
Scott Dunlap's Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Network
Mike Stutz's Database of Railroad Attractions at DenverRails.com
RRHistorical.com--"Your First Stop for Railroad Historical Information"
Chesapeake & Ohio 614 at Iron Horse Enterprises
Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum

Nickel Plate 765

765.org
an article at the Fort Wayne News Sentinel

Cincinnati Railroad Club at Cincinnati Union Terminal

The Railroad Model and Historical Society of Southeastern Ohio

The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust -- Peppercorn class A1 Pacific steam locomotive
UKSteam Infor, UK Railway Preservation Site
Great Western Society, Bristol Group & Signal and Telegraph Project

Rail History (return to top)
From The Lost Promise of the American Railroad by Mark Reutter:

The impact of interstates would be little short of shattering. Between 1956 and 1969, a total of 28,800 miles of interstate highways were opened to traffic. In the same period, 59,400 miles of railroad were taken out of passenger service. General Motors, like many other manufacturers, bailed out of the passenger-train business in the 1950s, although it continued to make diesel freight locomotives at its plant in La Grange, Illinois. America's rail-passenger service dwindled from 2,500 intercity (noncommuter) trains operated in 1954 to fewer than 500 in 1969. By that time it was impossible to ride a train between Houston and Dallas or Pittsburgh and Cleveland. Gone was the South's first streamliner, the Rebel. Other trains that figured prominently in the great speed-up of the 1930s--the Chicago & North Western's 400's, the B·&·O's Royal Blue, the Milwaukee Road's Hiawathas, the Union Pacific's City of Portland, the New Haven's Comet--were excised from the timetable or combined with other trains. Cars built for the world-famous 20th Century Limited were sold to the Mexican National Railways, which ran them out of Guadalajara and Mexico City.

The Lost Promise of the American Railroad
by Mark Reutter -- gone
(an archive is available here at archive.org)

Streamliners--America's Lost Trains,
an American Experience presentation by PBS

The Pioneer Zephyr
at the Museum of Science & Technology in Chicago

The California Zephyr Virtual Museum

Riding the Zephyr by Terry Hogan
The Mark Twain Zephyr at NRMA

The American Railroads: A Long and Storied History (american-rails.com)

"Styled to sell"--an article at Trains.com about the men who designed the streamlined passenger trains of the '30s by John Kelly

Ad*Access, with hundreds of railroad advertisements from 1944 to 1954

"I am afraid we ruined a lot of good railroad men in Galesburg, during the two days we ran the Zephyr back and forth through the Burlington switch yards, as our cameras recorded action violating all the safety first regulations they had learned in a lifetime. Our picture is very bad railroading but thrilling entertainment." -- Glendon Allvine, producer of The Silver Streak

A Review of the 1934 RKO Radio Pictures Silver Streak by Bill Monson

Art Deco posters from the Streamliner era are available at ArtDecoPosters.com
TrainPostersFree.com -- beautiful b&w posters of steam-age locomotives

Gary Schaal's Columbus Union Station page (new URL)
Joseph Brennan's Abandoned Stations of NYC

"Saluda" (html | pdf) by Frank Clodfelter from the November 1984 "Trains" magazine

O. Winston Link

August 3, 2000 audio story at NPR (RealAudio)
February 2, 2000 Obituary at NPR (RealAudio)

Rembembering O. Winston Link at NPR
Link's Trains at NPR The Fading Giant: Bygone Train Sights and Sounds at NPR

a retrospective at The Smithsonian

Mark Plank's Unofficial Home Page of the T&OC

Rail Passenger Service (return to top)

...Congress will have to begin treating Amtrak, the nation's passenger railroad, as what it is: "an essential component of our national transportation system." -- Philadelphia Inquirer

National Association of Railroad Passengers

Midwest High Speed Rail, promoting high-speed passenger rail service in the midwest

Keep the Trains Running at the Washington Post
Back on Track at the Philadelphia Enquirer
Deadly Hijackings May Turn More Attention to the Rails at the Philadelphia Enquirer
Time to Reconsider High-Speed Rail at the Denver Post
Trains Need Help, Too at the NY Times
Switching Tracks to Meet Demand at the Baltimore Sun
Face It, Rail Needs Subsidy at the LA Times

Corporate (return to top)
The CSX Corporation Home Page
The Norfolk Southern Corporation Home Page
Amtrak's Station on the World Wide Web
The Via Home Page
The Union Pacific Railroad Home Page
Other Sites (return to top)
Ohio Central 6325 Restoration Board

RailwayStation.com--home of the US Railroad Map for Windows

Steam in Ohio by Jason Johnson
David Dupler's Railroad Page with photos of Chessie System and Conrail railroading in Athens during the '70s and '80s--new URL
David Dupler's Hocking Valley Scenic Railroad Gallery--new URL
Ohio Trains by Matt Mantell
Chessie Photo Archives and CSX Photo Archives by Dean J. Heacock
The Columbus Ohio Railroad Gallery--"original photos from the Central Ohio area"
Ohio Existing Railroad Stations by Dan West--new URL
Michigan Railroad Photos, Information, & Links
Pennsylvania Existing Railroad Station by Dan West
Michigan Passenger Stations by Lou Van Winkle
The Owosso Michigan Railroad Page by Steve Schmidt
The Lost Engines of Roanoke
Rails USA--"All Rail All American Search Engine and Directory" by Greg Chadwick
Railroad.net--forums for rail enthusiasts
The RIP Track--photos from the collection of Darryl Van Nort
Jerry's Railroad Photo Album
The 1953 B&O Operations Manual, transcribed into HTML by Ed Hobbs.
Cyberspace World Railroad Home Page by Daniel Dawdy
John Campbell's RR_Links Home Page, which includes a large list of surviving cabooses
Thoroughbred Home Page by Chris Toth; includes Train Number Groups
TotalCSX
CSX Railfan Magazine
Railfan.net--"By Railfans for Railfans"
RailPictures.net
TrainWeb.com
Motive Power News--railroad locomotive rosters
RailServe--Internet Railroad Directory
North American Railroad Frequencies as compiled by Jon Roma
Dover Harbor--a restored heavyweight pullman passenger rail car
Fallen Flag Railroad Photos--over 8000 photos
Stan's Railpix--A Railroad Photo Gallery by Stan Feldman
Norfolk Southern Photo Archive including NS Roster and radio freqs; by Jonathon Sharp
RailHams E-Mail List
Muskegon's Railroads by Kevin Wootton--the operations of CSX and Michigan Shore

SteamWhistles.com--"The Voice of the Iron Horse"

Suggested Photo Locations by others


Disclaimer:

This is a collection of links that I have found useful or interesting, either professionally or personally. It is maintained for my own use, and is subject to change at any time. No claims are made to completeness, accuracy, or competence. No endorsement of any site, individual, product, or corporation is intended. With these caveats, anyone is welcome to browse these links or to use this page.

Attributions:

Burlington Zepher print advertisement: Ad*Access On-Line Project - Ad # T2871; John W. Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising & Marketing History; Duke University Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library; http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/adaccess/