Thursday, August 21, 2008

Men and Trains

The California Trolley and Railroad Corporation, www.ctrc.org, is having their volunteer recognition dinner this evening. I plan to attend (as a spouse of a volunteer).

This is a wonderful organization that is dedicated to restoring steam locomotives. I have attended some of their meetings. The meetings are usually all male, and the men are usually over 40 years old. They are really dedicated to their trains. They know a lot about them and they seem to be fascinated by their inner workings.

These men track the history of these trains. They know about the updates and retrofits. They spend weekends cleaning off layers of grease on parts and repainting them.

So what exactly is the appeal of these old trains? I think we live in an electronic age, but prior to that we lived in a mechanical age. Mechanical engineering is a wonder and that's what fascinates them.

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