Amtrak: An American Story

If you are even a little younger than I am (mid 50s), you will have a hard time remembering the creation of Amtrak. I was a junior in high school when it was created and I barely remember this happening, despite being a rail fan at a young age. That alone makes this a valuable book, as there are millions of people who fail to understand just how amazing it is that Amtrak is still alive and kicking.The book consists of three basic parts interwoven together. Every 3 or 4 pages there is a page or 2 that is dedicated to the story of an Amtrak employee. Most all are people who have either been at the company since the beginning or have had amazing stories while at the company, all of which makes for fascinating reading. The space in between the stories is dedicated to well captioned photos of the railroad. The photographs cover just about the entire Amtrak operation and include copies of posters, brochures and advertising material that has long gone out of use. Finally, there is a timeline that runs along the top of the pages which shows major milestones in Amtrak history, along with major events in world history that help put the time frame into perspective.The last 10% of the book is dedicated to a day in the life sort of photograph arrangement. They asked employees on one single day to photograph whatever they felt was worthy and send it in to the corporate offices. The result is a look at the railroad from across the span of a day and a country. Although these are "amateur" photographs, most are extremely well done and it is obvious that the employees put much thought into what they thought was important to portray.Although this is not a "detailed" history, it makes for fine reading and would be a wonderful addition to a train buffs library. It is also a look at a piece of American history and should be of interest to those with an interest in history.

I'll admit that I'm an AMTRAK junkie, so I may be a wee bit biased, but this is an excellent book. If you are into modern American railroading, you will enjoy this. This book has many shots of locomotives and passenger cars in a variety of settings. Also contains some cool old Amtrak advertisements and other tidbits of nostalgia and information. The stories are short but interesting; easy to pick up, read a few pages, and set back down till later (for us overly multi-tasked earthlings). They present a decent history of Amtrak as presented by current and past Amtrak employees. So get a copy and lean back in your comfortable Superliner seat. When your scanner pops on and you hear the engineer call "Highball Amtrak" start reading.

Ive had an intrest in railroads and particularly Amtrak since my first trip to Chicago in 1990 when I was four. This book only deepened my intrest in Amtrak. It tells the stories of each of the four decades Amtrak has been in operation though accounts by actual Amtrak employees and other figures who have ties in the history of the railroad. Many of the stories of how employees started off with a lowly yet important position such as a baggage handler or a ticket agent were able to advance up the company ladder to higher management positions on the railroad. There are many vivid captioned pictures that illustrate the company's history as well. The final section of the book is a very intresting look into a typical 24 hour period in the life of Amtrak, illistrated through pictures taken from across the National rail network.Overall the book is written kind of unconventionally, through the employee entrees and not the typical biographical type history. I feel this helps better illustrate the human element that goes into making the railroad run. I enjoyed it very much and would recommend it to anyone who has an intrest in Amtrak, rail travel, or railroads in general!

When I ordered this I was expecting it to be similar to another Amtrak book called All Aboard Amtrak: 1971-1991 in that it would cover the overall history of Amtrak, it's routes, rolling stock and the challenges the people of Amtrak had to face. I was both right and wrong in believing this. I was was right in the sense that this book did just that. However, I was wrong in that this book does not have much of a complete narrative of the history of Amtrak. Rather it has both current and former employees of Amtrak tell of their experiences with the company at certain stages of it's existence with brief passages at the beginning of each chapter describing the time period in question. Information on rolling stock, routes and stations are provided by a collection of photographs at the end of each chapter. However specifications for the different pieces of rolling stock was not provided aside from basic facts. The pictures included are extremely good as well and include old advertising, shots inside the trains and even includes shots of rare equipment such as the SPV-2000s, the LRC train leased from VIA, and the old Turbotrains and Turboliners.It's not a bad read, particularly if your a fan of Amtrak and reading of the personal stories of some of Amtrak's employees. However if your looking for a book that contains a lot of detailed information for things such as equipment rosters and a system map then this may not be the one you want. Just think of what you want before ordering.

This is a great picture book with rare photographs. Like it or not, it is published by Amtrak folks, but the pictures don't lie. This is a worthwhile, historical record of the same caliber of the Making of the Washington DC Metro book. It's has several photographs of rare scenes, including one of the infamous Union Station Washington DC Visitors' Center, something that has curiously few photographs to see.If you're a fan of passenger trains and understand the significance of the forty-year anniversary of a public/private corporation that was designed to fail, you need this book.