Wallace W. Abbey: A Life in Railroad Photography

Wally Abbey’s voice is essential in telling the story of American railroading in the latter half of the twentieth century. As a journalist, author, historian, and railroad industry communications executive, he helped a wide variety of constituency groups understand and appreciate what was omnipresent in the nation’s life: a world of locomotives, passenger trains, big-city terminals, small-town depots, along with the hundreds of thousands of people who called themselves railroaders. His command of the subject had roots in his early years as an apprentice railroader and a young reporter, experiences that would inform all his later work in magazines, books, and corporate communications.  

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website.