Part 1 George W. Wireman Trains are deeply ingrained in the American heritage, a part of the zest for living and accomplishment. Trains are hard, man-sized, brutal work, as well as highly tuned, precision machines that can be both master and servant, and they can talk to those who will but pause to listen.
Trains are timepieces living hard-won schedules, fighting miles of space.
Trains are a roar of power, a whine of steel on steel, an irresistible siren s call to the intriguing mysteries of faraway places. We have all waved a salute to a passing engineer. We can remember the sight of a gleaming streamliner speeding along the floor of a peaceful valley, the muffled echo of its whistle resounding from the. summer green velvet of the rolling hills beyond. The once great railway network of the United Stales was at one time so vast that its overall dimensions were hard to comprehend, and even harder yet to describe. The younger generation of today would find it hard to believe that many years ago there was a small railroad that ran from Emmitsburg to Rocky Ridge, a distance of seven miles.