How My Rail Hobby Started

The Seaboard Station in its heyday, abt 1930

My first stop on the tracks to becoming a rail and transit enthusiast began in late December 1976, when I was nearly 12 years old, a 6th grader in Miami, Florida.

Our nation just celebrated its Bicentennial the previous summer, but the hoopla continued anyway. Part of the festivities included the American Freedom Train coming to town, and it seemed to be a ‘big deal’ to my parents.

Initiated by train enthusiast Ross Rowland, the Freedom Train was a 26-car-long train led by shiny black steam engines, complete with a red, white, and blue patriotic stripe. The patrons stood on a moving walkway that passed by artifacts ranging from a copy of the Declaration of Independence to Dorothy Garland’s shoes in The Wizard of Oz. Based on my research, tickets were $2 each and sold on a first-come, first-served basis. There was no Ticketmaster back then!

 We left our home, drove across the Julia Tuttle Causeway over Biscayne Bay, headed on I-95 South, exited the highway, and arrived at the Seaboard/Amtrak Station at 2206 NW 7th Ave less than 20 minutes after leaving home. It was a familiar ride, similar to our route to the Orange Bowl Stadium,   but my father exited his 1973 cream yellow Riviera

Buick into an industrial neighborhood west of downtown that I have never been to.

I don’t recall many of the exhibition details. I don’t remember much of the exhibit details. I do remember a long line to enter the train, and I remember the weather; it was a delightfully cool, cloudy day, by Miami standards, probably 65 degrees or so, which made the people watching and waiting for this 12-year-old much more palatable.

 I don’t remember whose idea it was to explore the train station, mine or my father’s,  Perhaps it was a joint decision, and I don’t think my overly cautious mother was too keen on the idea, but she acquiesced to the impromptu tour

I quickly realized that I stumbled into a dusty portal of the then-recent past. Starting from the trackside, Beginning at trackside, I noticed weeds growing out of the tracks and outdated signage. The sense of near abandonment continued as we approached the station building: water dripping from the roof, and even a dangling wire hanging off of the covered entryway leading from the tracks to the station.

 This wasn’t  Eastern Airlines gleaning bustling Concourse C at Miami International Airport, 6 miles away;  I was time traveling! It dawned on me that there was a major shift in our nation’s transportation network, in less than 30 years before this 1976 visit, and no one told me about it!

My dad was the tour guide. He pointed out the long-closed retail shops, perhaps a barbershop; I can hear him say, “Hey How [my nickname] look over here, that must have been the barbershop.” I can also hear him exclaim, “I haven’t been here in 20 years.” We found the arrival/departure board, which was a chalkboard scribbled with Amtrak’s 2 daily arrivals and departures to New York.

 I couldn’t believe it: Eastern Airlines had monochrome CRT monitors, and this place still had a chalkboard!

The waiting room was a dark, musty, and non-airconditioned room, with a high ceiling and painted in the corporate colors of Amtrak, a bold blue and an orangish red which did not match the station's Mediterranean Revival architectural, late 1920s vibe.

Ticket Window

I walked up to the ticket window, and I asked for a schedule, and was handed a thick Amtrak National Timetable that listed all of Amtrak’s trains as of late 1976.

 This led to hours of entertainment…I could close my bedroom door and plan my imaginary itineraries, with Atlas in hand. I was amazed to discover that rail travel was alive and well in certain pockets of our country- the Northeast, the Chicago area, and even the West Coast. 

 My second stop  as a railfan was the Miami Beach Public Library,  children’s department, where I checked out all of their books on passenger trains, all 6 of them, which were written during the post-World War II glory days of American Train travel 

 I marveled at the black-and-white photos of well-dressed patrons in the 1940’s sitting in luxurious coach cars, sleeping in Pullman Cars, or eating off of crisp white linen tablecloths

Seaboard Parlour Car.

in the dining car. I was mesmerized by the photos of the jam-packed train stations of New York, Grand Central, and Pennsylvania Station!

Shortly thereafter, I did a family trip to Washington, DC. I was enthralled by the then brand-new Metrorail system, and added rapid transit enthusiast to the railfan hobby dossier.. I read the glossy Metro guide Washington Post insert that my aunt, a Bethesda resident, handed to me, and read it over and over again. 

 I was also fascinated by trackage around Union Station and relishing in ny observation from the Metro subway window of a much busier station than Miami’s 4 trains per day. 

Washington Metro Station

My third stop on my newfound hobby was the newspaper archive of the Miami Historical Museum. I learned about the two stations that served Miami: the Seaboard Coastline Station that I had visited in 1976, and the Florida East Coast Railway station that was torn down in 1963. I learned about the famed steamliners that served the Miami market, to name just a few: the Silver Meteor, Silver Star, Floridian, and Champion. I also found files of brochures on the New York and Chicago-bound trains that served Miami. 

My fourth stop involved speaking to older relatives and teachers about their last train trip. It usually was before they had moved to Florida, probably in the mid to late 1950s range. Relatives did mention that other relatives had taken the train, including my great-grandmother in the early 1940s and a great-uncle who liked to economize and didn’t fly until the late 1950s. 

So, my fifth stop was joining NARP- the National Association of Railroad Passengers. I subscribed to their newsletter, and even called their hotline--long distance--to hear about Amtrak’s latest funding victories and struggles. Some teens in the ’80s spent their money at record stores; I spent my money calling a transportation hotline.

 My fifth stop was joining a Miami railfans group, which would meet once a month at the Triple A- American Automobile Association (af all places) Miami headquarters on Biscayne Blvd. These older, Southern-sounding men ( a Miami rarity)  would talk about trains, watch films about trains, and plan excursions on trains.  My father and I  even joined them on one of their excursions. At one of these meetings, I met a gentleman who was a self-taught historian, author, and memorabilia collector named Seth Bramson, who invited us over to his childhood home to see his very extensive railroadiana collection, ranging from conductor uniforms to the signage from a demolished local train station.

My sixth stop was subscribing to magazines…Trains, Railroad and Railfan, and my favorite Passenger Train Journal. Some teens at that time went to magazine stands to peek at Playboy; I went to peek at train magazines. I still do. No visit to Barnes and Noble is complete without walking by the magazine section to see if the train magazines are in stock.

My seventh stop, six years after first visiting the Amtrak station, was writing my college application essay. I wrote it a subject I was familiar with; I don’t remember the exact title, but along the lines of ‘The Importance of Passenger Rail Transportation in 1983 America.’ 

My 8th stop. At the same time, I became interested in the urban form and rail transit. This led to a Master's in Urban Planning. The classes were interesting, but working in the field did not match my personality. I found a much more meaningful career in Education/School Counseling,  from which I will be retiring in the near future, after thirty years in the field. 

My ninth stop in this journey is my fledgling travel blog, where I focus on areas of interest accessible by public transit. 

 I haven't reached the 10th stop, but I might join a local rail history group and volunteer with a rail advocacy group.   Who knew that a 20-minute visit to a train station in 1976 would turn into a lifelong hobby?