Many locomotives as I have seen and ridden, a new one is always a wonder to me; chokes me up, even, it means so much. I hear men rave over horses, and marvel at it when I think of the iron horse. I hear them chatter of distance, and my mind turns to the annihilator. I hear them brag of ships, and I think of the ship that ploughs the mountains and rivers and plains. And when they talk of speed--what can I think of but her? "A volume of sketches from the facile pen of Frank H. Spearman.The sketches are of railroading up or down the Great Divide which forms the backbone of the continent or trekking trains across the immense veldt which stretches between the Giant City of the West and the Centennial State.Railroading is a hard life.
The men engaged in the train service must face every kind of weather, from sunshine to blizzard. Add to this the fact that correctness of decision or error in action may save or lose many lives. Such a time may come to a trainman at any moment. Mr. Spearman has fully realized his possibilities and seized on such critical times for his stories. And then he tells them clearly and correctly - true in every detail. He tells them, too, so vividly and distinctly that they thrill and startle as would the fragmentary story of a critical battle. You feel as though reading of a genuine tragedy in which lives are at stake, and through which men move with the quick consciousness of the responsibility which rests upon them.
" -Book News "The ten tales in the volume by Frank H. Spearman deal with the picturesque and exciting side of railroad life, but they almost make the timid reader register a solemn vow never to travel by train again. Mr. Spearman's peculiarly vivid descriptive style brings the danger of railroad travel home to faint-hearted people with far more force than the wildest imaginings. This is because the stories ring true, and one feels that the author knows what he is writing about. If not a practical railroad man, he is perfectly familiar with all the technicalities of the profession and knows how trains are made up and run. The courage and bravery, the 'nerve' as he puts it, of engineers and other employees who run trains during strikes or on some great emergency, are well set forth. Knowing Foley, no one would ever feel the slightest hesitancy in traveling with him, or with the 'Kid Engineer.
' The life of these men begets in them courage, quick decision and the nerve to carry out orders or die in the ditch." -The Delineator CONTENTS The Nerve of Foley Second Seventy-Seven The Kid Engineer The Sky-Scraper Soda-Water Sal The McWilliams Special The Million-Dollar Freight-Train Bucks Sankey's Double Header Siclone Clark.