The Great Railroad Revolution: The History of Trains in America
Wolmar, a noted historian specializing in the British railway industry, here turns his attention to American railroads (which, at their peak in 1916, covered 254,037 miles of track). He focuses mostly on the nineteenth century; the twentieth century, he notes, saw mostly “decline and waning influence,” but it was in the 1800s that railroads were born, grew to maturity, and became the country’s dominant form of transportation. Wolmar is clearly in love with his subject—it’s easy to imagine him as a sort of walking encyclopedia of railroad lore—and his enthusiasm for his material shines through on every page. He finds the decline and increasing irrelevance of the railroad—especially the passenger rails—a deeply saddening aspect of contemporary life, and he makes a convincing case that, in losing rail travel as a fundamental human experience, we’ve lost a hugely important part of ourselves and our history. --David Pitt