Trains and country music - great video

[Trainman203]

For people like me, of a certain age and from the Deep South, steam engines and country music are, and forever will be, permanently joined.

This is one of the best music/steam engine videos I've ever seen.  The entire cadence  is of steam engine out on the road.  The fiddle breaks are perfect traveling music coupled with the smoke rolling back and the hypnotic rolling drivers.  If you listen carefully, the steel player is doing beautifully toned steam whistles, especially when Hank Snow sings the chorus.  And at one point when  Hank sings the word blow, the steam shoots  up from the whistle.

The footage is of the Gainesville Midland in Georgia in 1956, originally silent film.  But there couldn't be a better soundtrack than this.  Hank Snow was a master train song country singer.  The music and the train are pure glory of the past.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=o3n04ewrNsk

[WoundedBear]

I guess ya gotta be that age and a southerner, cause, I'm sorry.....but as a boy from western Canada, that sort of nostalgia and Hank Snow, don't do a thing for me.

Got anything by Stompin' Tom?

Sid

[Trainman203]

That's ok Sid. Everyone is different . 

But, Hank Snow was from Nova Scotia, worked on the fishing boats for years building a career as a country singer in Canada.  He eventually moved the US because the market was bigger.  He is perhaps the best known train song guy over the years,  although he did plenty of other stuff.

I better Google Stompin Tom, not familiar with him.

Surely you liked the video part though.  By what I've seen of your models, I would think you would have.

[Woody Elmore]

Hey wounded bear: Hank Snow did a song called Canadian Pacific. He sings about fishing in New Foundland and Nova Scotia and wanting to return home to the west. So he takes the CP.

[WoundedBear]

I'll have to Google Hank Snow....never knew about his Canadian connection. Interesting.

Sid

[RAM]

Well no music, but check this out.  A 2-10-2 which is only a little bit larger than the 2-10-0.  As far as I know, I never saw them in road service, only switching.  www.bartlesvillelocomotive.org

[jbrock27]

One of my favorites:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHpClGAAvpg

[Trainman203]

After 60 years of steam engines being gone .......their image, not the diesel's, still dominates popular culture when trains are evoked.  There's a universe separating my music and Brock's, but the steam locomotive imagery endures.  That is a very,very cool locomotive behind the band, and relatively accurate at that, considering that no one sees them in everyday life anymore..

[Trainman203]

RAM, those very early Santa Fee 2-10-2's were designed for Raton Pass as I recall.  Someone that knows more than me, please report.

[jbrock27]

That is a very,very cool locomotive behind the band, and relatively accurate at that, considering that no one sees them in everyday life anymore..

I think they (AC/DC) probably got lucky with that one TM!  LOL

[jbrock27]

And PS-I do like Johnny Cash and Kenny Rogers too

[RAM]

Trainmen you are correct.  When they were replace by the 63 inch driver 3800-3900 2-10-2s they went system wide.  How ever with a top speed of 35 mph they soon found their way into local and yard service.  Sad to say it was the only 2-10-2 saved.  No 2-8-2s, 2-8-4s 4-8-2s were saved.

[Trainman203]

Slightly off topic.....

RAM, lots of older 2-8-0s became yard engines later in life because they could no longer deliver the ever increasing tonnage and speed requirements.  The MP had 19 4-8-0s with Belpaire fire boxes that were almost immediately bumped into the yards when new 2-10-2s came in during 1916. Many of the 2-10-2s later went into yard and hump service too as better 2-8-2's and 2-8-4's came around.

This practice continues into the diesel era.  I don't know diesels very well, but I did see some GP 30s on the CSX a couple of years ago, assigned to switching a refinery in Pascagoula MS.

Now, back to my video.  Did anyone else like it nearly as much as I did?  Or am I hopelessly trapped in the romanticism of the past?

[Woody Elmore]

I Googled Gainsville Midland Railroad and came up a history sight dedicated to the railroad. There is a link to the same movie featured in the Hank Snow song but there is extra footage including a SAL Baldwin switcher in the old black and red livery.

Of interest to folks with a Bachmann Russian decapod - GM engine #208 is a Russian decapod and is on display in downtown Gainsville.

In the video I refer to, the train is running along then all of a sudden there is black smoke. I know from fan trips I have taken is that most of the time smoke isn't that black. The fireman was throwing sand into the firebox to make the smoke for the camera. What would the EPA say!

Happy New Year to everybody - I'll visit this site again next year.

[DAVE2744]

203 - Thank you for the video link.  Pic and music terrific.  I'm happy to inform you, you are stuck in the romance of the past, just like a lot of us.  See you around.  Dave