This is the story of the career of the author's mysterious great uncle Raymond de Candolle, who had apparently disappeared into the bowels of London, at the turn of the twentieth century. It begins when he joins a group of enterprising bankers, engineers and tycoons, fascinated by international railway opportunities. They build railroads in Mexico, Spain, China, Columbia, and eventually Raymond heads up Argentina's leading railway. Just as the First World War is about to break out, he is sent to solve a dispute with Germany's Baghdad Railway in Anatolia. He is recruited by the British War Cabinet in 1916 to help stop the German advance in Romania. As chaos erupts in Russia they send him to deal with the Trans-Siberian Railway, the rise of the Bolsheviks, and finally the capture of Mosul in 1918. He is active at the Paris Peace Conference in settling Romania's reparations and the take-over of the Baghdad railway. In 1921 it is back to Anatolia to deal with its dilapidated railway, and the eventual horrors of the Smyrna genocide. He shakes hands with a victorious Kemal Ataturk. Raymond's story concludes with his family, and their good friend Ian Fleming, listening to his conclusions about the future.

This book is a gallery of more than two hundred photographs, including a colour section, featuring a selection of Great Western Railway/British Railways (Western) branch lines and similar services taken between 1900 and 1965\. The emphasis is pictorial rather than factual with the aim of using photographs provided by two transport charities as well as the author, all of which are unlikely to have appeared previously in print or on the Internet. Generally, images depict working trains surrounded by recognisable infrastructure, often with station nameboards visible. Such pictures should be of particular interest to railway modellers as well as invoking nostalgia for the older generation who were pursuing their hobby around the time the pictures were taken. Most of the branch lines covered were victims of the 1960s "Beeching Axe", with closure to passengers or complete closure coming even earlier in some cases. Most of the services depicted are steam operated although a few GWR and BR diesel railcars/multiple units are included. All the scenes seem to reflect a more leisurely way of life than exists today.

During the mid-19th Century, thousands of unknown workers from so many countries toiled incessantly and under great danger during the construction of the railroad that joined the Atlantic city of Colon with the Pacific city of Panama, making it the world's first transcontinental railway. This is its story. Bilingual text in Spanish and English. Al mediados del siglo 19, miles de trabajadores inc gnitos de tantos pa ses trabajaron sin descanso y bajo gran peligro durante la construcci n del ferrocarril que uni la ciudad caribe a de Col n con la ciudad de Panam en el pac fico, convirti ndolo en el primer ferrocarril transcontinental del mundo. Esta es su historia. Texto biling e en espa ol e ingl s.

Fully updated essential guide to exploring Britain by train, Railway Day Trips is ideal for anyone planning or looking for inspiration for a rail journey. From bestselling railway author Julian Holland. This pocket companion is perfect for both casual and seasoned rail travellers. Plan adventures, follow the changing landscape through the train window and discover fascinating destinations. Each journey incorporates a location map, route diagram and descriptive text on its history and geography, plus some of the highlights awaiting you at each destination. High-quality photographs illustrate every route throughout the book. Based on his extensive knowledge of British rail travel, the author reveals appealing quirks of the various routes and provides practical tips on how to make the most of your journey. 160 day trips from all over the country are featured, departing from major towns and cities and culminating at a variety of interesting destinations. This 2nd edition includes 10 new routes: * Cambridge to Ipswich * Hereford to Newport * Cardiff to Ebbw Vale * Carmarthen to Fishguard * Manchester to Southport * Sheffield to Lincoln * Middlesbrough to Newcastle * Glasgow to Perth * Edinburgh to Tweedbank * Inverness to Wick

Rails Under the Mighty Hudson tells a story that begins in the final years of the nineteenth century and reaches fulfillment in the first decade of the twentieth: namely, the building of rail tunnels under the Hudson River linking New Jersey and New York. These tunnels remain in service today-although one is temporarily out of service since its Manhattan terminal was under the World Trade Center-and are the only rail crossings of the Hudson in the metropolitan area.Two of the tunnels were built by the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad, a company headed by William Gibbs McAdoo, a man who later served as U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and even mounted a campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination at one point. McAdoo's H&M remains in service today as the PATH System of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.The other tunnel was opened in 1910 by the Pennsylvania Railroad, led to the magnificent Penn Station on Eighth Avenue and 33rd Street, and remains in daily service today for both Amtrak and New Jersey Transit. The author has updated this new edition with additional photographs, a concluding chapter on recent developments, and a Preface that recounts the last trains of September to the World Trade Center Terminal.

NOTHING LIKE IT IN THE WORLD is the story of the men who built the transcontinental railroad - the investors who risked their businesses and money; the enlightened politicians who understood its importance; the engineers and surveyors who risked, and sometimes lost, their lives; and the Irish and Chinese immigrants, the defeated Confederate soldiers, and the other labourers who did the backbreaking and dangerous work on the tracks. The US government pitted two companies - the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific Railroads - against each other in a race for funding, encouraging speed over caution. Locomotives, rails and spikes were shipped from the East through Panama or around South America to the West, or lugged across the country to the Plains. In Ambrose's hands, this enterprise, with its huge expenditure of brainpower, muscle and sweat, comes vibrantly to life.

This is a unique and lively account of those years, describing the technicalities of the work and the hardships as well as many lighter moments enjoyed by the apprentices, against the backdrop of the gradual run-down of steam on the Western.

Is any disaster really forgotten? It is never forgotten by the survivors who lived through the trauma. It is never forgotten by the emergency services who tried to save the day. It is never forgotten by the relatives of those who never came home. Britain's Lost Tragedies Uncovered is a look at the tragedies and disasters that may not have stayed in public memory, but are no less terrible than their more famous counterparts. From a late-nineteenth-century family massacre in London to two separate fatal crashes at Dibbles Bridge in Yorkshire, and the worst-ever aviation show crash in post-war Farnborough to the horrifying Barnsley Public Hall disaster - here are twenty-three accounts of true devastation and stunning bravery. They are tales that deserve to be remembered.

Robert A. Van Wyck, mayor of the greater city of New York, broke ground for the first subway line by City Hall on March 24, 1900. It took four years, six months, and twenty-three days to build the line from City Hall to West 145th Street in Harlem. Things rarely went that quickly ever again. The Routes Not Taken explores the often dramatic stories behind the unbuilt or unfinished subway lines, shedding light on a significant part of New York City's history that has been almost completely ignored until now. Home to one of the world's largest subway systems, New York City made constant efforts to expand its underground labyrinth, efforts that were often met with unexpected obstacles: financial shortfalls, clashing agendas of mayors and borough presidents, battles with local community groups, and much more. After discovering a copy of the 1929 subway expansion map, author Joseph Raskin began his own investigation into the city's underbelly. Using research from libraries, historical societies, and transit agencies throughout the New York metropolitan area, Raskin provides a fascinating history of the Big Apple's unfinished business that until now has been only tantalizing stories retold by public-transit experts. The Routes Not Taken sheds light on the tunnels and stations that were completed for lines that were never fulfilled: the efforts to expand the Hudson tubes into a fullfledged subway; the Flushing line, and why it never made it past Flushing; a platform underneath Brooklyn's Nevins Street station that has remained unused for more than a century; and the 2nd Avenue line-long the symbol of dashed dreams-deferred countless times since the original plans were presented in 1929. Raskin also reveals the figures and personalities involved, including why Fiorello LaGuardia could not grasp the importance of subway lines and why Robert Moses found them to be old and boring. By focusing on the unbuilt lines, Raskin illustrates how the existing subway system is actually a Herculean feat of countless political compromises. Filled with illustrations of the extravagant expansion plans, The Routes Not Taken provides an enduring contribution to the transportation history of New York City.

"Gerald Berk's Alternative Tracks is a lean but provocative, timely, insightful, and forcefully written challenge to the conventional wisdom about industrial America's political economy". -- Review of Politics At the heart of Alternative Tracks is the historical relationship between democracy. and the modern corporation. Gerald Berk uses the case of the railroad industry to show that industrial centralization and corporate hierarchy did not follow a course solely determined by the efficiency imperatives of modern technology. Rather, collective choice and the state had lasting influence on the development of corporate capitalism. Moreover, the role of government depended less on the exercise of interest-group or class power than it did on the protracted struggle over constitutional norms of fairness and justice relating to corporation and the market. Mediated through the court, Congress, and the bureaucracy, this struggle had profound effects on the organization of railroads, the pattern of urbanization, and the practice of business regulation. "A very impressive work ...Offers the reader real insight into the technical factors and financial arrangements involved in the development of American railroads". -- Perspectives on Political Science "Berk has offered some powerful questions for future scholars to keep in mind, and no student of railroad history or the history of business can afford to overlook this book". -- American Historical Review "An ambitious effort to make sense of how the modern American state was fashioned". -- American Political Science Review

For this second book in the Transport Philately series on public transport issues featured on postage stamps, once again the author will combine two of his life-long hobbies as he looks at railways around the world on standard gauge tracks that encompasses the majority of the western worlds major railway arteries. The book will also illustrate railways on other, similar gauges of track where they constitute a countrys major arteries, but it is not an exhaustive survey encompassing every country and every issue for that one needs to refer to major catalogue issues by such well-known authorities as Stanley Gibbons Plc. There have been many and varied reasons why postal authorities have issued stamps featuring railway subjects, varying from major anniversaries to national pride, the latter often from the former Eastern-bloc countries but that is not by all means. The Royal Mail in the UK has certainly not ignored railways, especially in later years, and the author will visit probably more of his native country's stamps than most other countries, but hes biased. The author often looks in his albums to try to understand why a particular country will sometimes be represented by bulging sections, whilst others are represented by but one or two stamp. And so, the book follows the story around the world in roughly an eastern journey, learning about some of the national histories on the way and admiring the attentions of some extremely accomplished artists that mean philatelists and rail-lovers alike can enjoy many beautiful miniature works of art.

In Great Britain there existed a practice of naming steam railway locomotives. The names chosen covered many and varied subjects, however a large number of those represented direct links with military personnel, regiments, squadrons, naval vessels, aircraft, battles and associated historic events. Memorably the Southern Railway (SR) created a Battle of Britain class of Light Pacific locomotives, which were named in recognition of Battle of Britain squadrons, airfields, aircraft and personnel. The Great Western Railway (GWR) re-named some of its express passenger Castle Class engines after Second World War aircraft. Names were displayed in varying styles on both sides of the locomotives, additionally some nameplates were adorned with ornate crests and badges. Long after the demise of mainline steam, rescued nameplates are still much sort after collectors' items, which when offered for sale command high prices. This generously illustrated publication highlights the relevant steam locomotives at work and explains the origins of the military names.

Last Train to Paradise is acclaimed novelist Les Standiford’s fast-paced and gripping true account of the extraordinary construction and spectacular demise of the Key West Railroad—one of the greatest engineering feats ever undertaken, destroyed in one fell swoop by the Labor Day hurricane of 1935. Brilliant and driven entrepreneur Henry Flagler’s dream fulfilled, the Key West Railroad stood as a magnificent achievement for more than twenty-two years, heralded as “the Eighth Wonder of the World.” Standiford brings the full force and fury of 1935’s deadly “Storm of the Century” and its sweeping destruction of “the railroad that crossed an ocean” to terrifying life. Last Train to Paradise celebrates a crowning achievement of Gilded Age ambition in a sweeping tale of the powerful forces of human ingenuity colliding with the even greater forces of nature’s wrath.

“A dramatic story . . . and Les Standiford has a good deal of fun with it all.” —Washington Post Book World
“A rousing—a deeply sobering—story.” —Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed
“A fascinating and incredibly compelling account . . . I could not put it down.” —Donald Trump
“A definitive account of the engineering feat that became known as ‘Flagler’s Folly’. . . A rousing adventure."—Atlanta Journal-Constitution

When the Stockton & Darlington Railway opened in 1825, it was the first steam-powered railway to carry passengers. Since then there has been no shortage of music connected with trains and railways: orchestral pieces and popular songs describing railway journeys; those that celebrate the opening of a new line; worksongs and blues describing the hardship of building the railroads, even the first use of sampled music used railway sounds as its source. From the pastoral serenity of the Flanders and Swann song 'Slow train' to the shrieking horror of holocaust trains in Steve Reich's Different Trains, the railway has inspired countless pieces of music. This is the first book to give a comprehensive coverage of music connected with the railways, it describes over 50 pieces of classical music and covers more than 250 popular songs.

Steam Engines is a stunningly illustrated, comprehensive guide to the history of the steam railway in Britain. This book tracks the development of the steam locomotive, from its earliest days in the 1800s through to the great trains of the mid-20th century. Learn how the success and rapid growth of this new form of power provided a vital form of transport across Britain and had a major impact on people's lives. The authors describe the development of the different lines and companies during the two World Wars and ultimately, the preservation of many of our much-loved locomotives. Packed with historical photographs and in-depth information, this box set includes a special key ring and is a must-have for any steam engine enthusiast.