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(Whistle) Music Spencer: Hi, I'm Spencer Christian.

On this episode of Tracks Ahead, we'll visit an Iowa couple who have turned their front yard into an oasis for garden train lovers.

We'll talk with a woman who is chronicling the history of working women in railroading, and we'll look in on an Indiana museum where steam is king.

The Suir Valley of south eastern Ireland is one of the most beautiful areas in the country.

The rolling hills and seaside scenery off set the hustle and bustle of the cities.

And it's no surprise that steam railroads ran here.

Thanks to the efforts of the Railway Preservation Society of Ireland, they're back in service once again.

Music Ancr: Ireland.

It is one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

The rolling hills of a rural countryside.

The breathtaking scenery of the Irish seacoast.

The hustle and bustle of big cities.

And, some of the greatest old steam engines you'll ever see.

Music Music For more than forty years now, the Railway Preservation Society of Ireland has been preserving and operating steam locomotives, which were rapidly disappearing from the Irish railway system.

The society owns and operates a fleet of nine steam locomotives, and more than twenty vintage cars, on what is essentially a rolling public museum.

Philip: Steam locomotives have been out of active use in Ireland since 1971, which is a lot later than the rest of the UK.

And I think we've got a very unique setup here with wider gauge, 5 foot 3 gauge and a unique collection of mainline steam locomotives.

It's important to bring that the general public.

We've got a role to play in Ireland education, and I think the days of boys playing trains is long gone.

And we're an active service for the general public.

You can't really appreciate a steam locomotive unless it's actually living and breathing.

And when the fire is inside it, and the smell of the smoke is wafting back across the platform, it creates a very unique atmosphere.

And I think this train, over and above all the other trains we run really embodies that atmosphere.

You'll find the people who come on this train really live and breath the three day tour.

In fact, I've already suggested that we should write a book about it.

There are so many anectodal stories about the exciting things that happen on this tour that wouldn't have happened if the locomotives were in a museum.

Gerry: Today's loco, 186, was one of the, a member of one of the most numerous class of locomotive in Ireland, a J15.

They were used all over the country because of their very light axle load and strong pulling power.

So they were used on a variety of trains, from goods, cattle trains, to passenger branch line trains.

So they had a vast usage over their life.

And they lasted to the end of steam in Ireland.

She was built in 1879 in Manchester.

Some of the engines were built in Dublin and some of them were built in Manchester.

She was one of the Manchester engines.

She was based around the country, but she finished her days based here in Waterford.

So it's kind of nice that she's back here on her fourth main tour where she finished up in company service.

So it's nice to have her back here.

Number 4 is one of the favorable engines.

She's a very good engine to work on.

She's e most modern engine we have.

She was built in 1947 in Darby for the NCC, which later turned into the UTA and into NER.

She was the last steam locomotive to work in the country, as she was one of the class built to haul trains to Derry and Port Rush.

She lasted very true to the end of steam trains in Ireland, hauling stone and milk trains to build the M1 motorway, which is the railway's enemy.

It spent it's last days hauling trains to build a motorway which was ultimately going to be the demise of the railway.

Ancr: The society runs the escorted trips to show off the Irish scenery, and to show off the trains.

The starting and finish points are often major cities like Belfast or Dublin.

And packed in between are thousands of memories in the making.

Philip: We run steam tours to basically every main city in Ireland throughout the year for the general public.

They can book very easily over our website www.rpsi-online.org.

There's just no better way of seeing the countryside.

The railway lines were always put through the countryside to avoid congestion around main cities.

It's the best way to see the seascapes and the countryside and the beautiful scenery that Ireland has to offer.

Gerry: The RPSI is the only operator of mainline trains in Ireland and has been around since 1964, and has a very unique collection of locos and also a very unique atmosphere on board our trains.

Anybody who travels on our trains always says that the atmosphere on the train is one.., there's something magical about traveling on the RPSI.

I like to try to think that we can keep that going.

Philip: We're always constantly changing.

I'm only 30 years old this year, so as a group of younger enthusiasts come on-stream, we've got a new rack of carriages out, we've got a selection of locomotives that have just come into our ownership from Irish Rail after years of loan.

We're facing a very bright future with the prospect of getting better grant aid, better funding, and a public that really wants to know about it's heritage for a change and is not ashamed about what it can say.

So I think we face a very bright future at the moment.

Music Music Music Ancr: Irish history.

Irish beauty.

Irish class.

The Irish work ethic.

It's everywhere you look.

But nowhere, is it more evident than on the trains of the Railway Preservation Society of Ireland.

Spencer: The Society owns and operates a fleet of nine steam locomotives and around 20 vintage carriages.

They offer trips on an annual basis, so check their website for additional information.

Next we travel to the heart of the country, to see how Gary & Ione Edlen have turned their Iowa riverside gardens into an oasis for train lovers.

Ancr: How many people buy locomotives and engines just to break them apart and rebuild them in a completely new way?

And how many people have garden railroads in their front yard as well as an HO scale layout in their living room?

The answer to all three questions is Gary and Ione Edlen.

Gary: When we got married, I had a layout in the mobile home I lived in in Arlington, Texas.

And when she saw it, from then on we have had railroads in the living room.

Ione: The model railroad in the house, first of all is something of great beauty and no one else that I know has 3-D pictures in their living room.

Ancr: Their Iowa home is a Mecca for train lovers.

The layout in their living room kept Gary busy for over 40 years.

Gary: Garden railroading became a very high interest to me the day Bachmann came out with their 42 ton Shay.

I had to have one, I just needed one real bad.

But I loved geared engines and I always have Basically that's all I have.

Ancr: Gary realized that garden railroading was a hobby that both he and Ione - an avid gardener - could enjoy together.

But first, they had to do a lot of work to prepare their property for the new trains.

They got to work installing the retaining walls and 40 cubic yards of dirt that would host 80 miniature shrubs and trees.

The property slopes downhill, enabling the layout to feature both an upper pond and a lower pond.

Gary hand laid the track, just as he had done with his old HO layout.

Now the Cascade Timber & Mining Railroad looks as though it's been there since the 1930s.

Gary: I'm modeling very loosely from the turn of the century til, up til 1938.

I've tried to stay very close to that.

I love this history.

I'm a real crazy nut about logging and also about geared engines and anything mechanical and moving.

I built a timber and mining railway because I love the uniqueness of all of the equipment they used in these industries.

Being a model builder, I am able to create models that are very complex and difficult, and yet could be built in the backwoods by any blacksmith or machinist at the time.

Ancr: Most of the structures, bridges and trestles on this 308-foot long garden railroad were scratch built by Gary.

There's the Sweet Pea Fertilizer plant, a tranquil mill overlooking the Cascade River, and a colorful windmill gas station built from photographs and sketches Gary took of an actual structure over 15 years ago.

Even most of the cars are scratch built or kitbashed.

Gary: Mostly, I buy the cars because I need to buy the trucks, and it's almost a cheap to buy them that way.

And then, I'm a person that can't stand having something that everyone else has.

So all of my equipment has to be of my own making.

It just takes a lot of guts, if you will, to take an $800 engine and tear it apart and make it into something else.

Millie, the Climax locomotive, I was honored to take first place at 2001 in Seattle at the National Garden Railway meet and the steam donkey placed first in off road equipment.

Ancr: While Gary keeps busy building everything from trestles to bucket coaling stations, Ione takes charge of the gardens.

Ione: In the spring I have to clean up, pull out, replant, and decide on some new annuals.

That pretty well takes up about a month, and then after that it's maintaining.

About an hour or so a day I spend out here and I deadhead the flowers and look for weeds if they dare to come up in my garden.

Ancr: Even though the nearest Garden Railroad club member lives 160 miles away, Gary and Ione manage to attend club meetings regularly.

Ione: We have met so many friends, so many great people, they're like family to us.

And we just really enjoy being with them all.

Gary: It's actually brought Ione and I closer together, working on the railroad, visiting around the countryside, meeting people.

We've met a lot of people in the hobby that I've always admired and had never met.

Going to the conventions and so forth.

Ione: It just comes together and we just really work together well on it.

And we appreciate what each other does and it's just a thing of beauty and of love.

Spencer: As with any railroad, work is never done, and Gary and Ione plan to continually upgrade and expand the operation.

In a moment, we'll visit with Shirley Burman, who has both photographed and collected images of women working in railroading.

She's written a book called, "She's Been Working on the Railroad," and she'll tell us about her latest research.

First, let's visit the rural countryside of Laporte, Indiana.

There, nestled in the trees, we'll find a unique outdoor museum featuring a varied collection of steam equipment.

Ancr: Perhaps no single word means so much to the world of railroading as the word "steam."

The technology of steam powered the industrial revolution of the late nineteenth century and without steam technology, there would have been no railroads during that time.

And almost nowhere is the legacy of steam preserved and honored as it is at the Hesston Steam Museum near LaPorte Indiana.

Ted: We have a very unique grounds here.

It's 155 acres.

But we've got a railroad that takes you on a journey that's two and half miles long, but it seems a great deal longer.

It winds through the woods, and it winds past farm fields.

It really gives you a sense of what narrow gauge railroading was, and it gives you a sense that you've gone some where and done something.

It also shows you the demonstration of steam that you couldn't get from any book.

You need to come in the gate, take a look around, look at the sawmill and the steam crane and the electric power plant and ride the steam locomotives to really understand what steam was in the turn of the century in our industrial age.

John Edris started, founded the Hesston Steam Museum by going t and purchasing a traction engine, steam tractor.

He couldn't run it at his property in the city, so he decided to buy some acreage out in the country.

That lead him to this site and he bought 22 acres.

In the course of time he kind of brought in people who were interested in steam and steam equipment and had steam equipment.

In the early fifties they put on their first steam show on Labor Day weekend.

Elliott Donnelly of RR Donnelly & Sons Printing happened out one day and took a look around and saw the guys really worked hard.

He was an avid steam buff, a railroad buff, he was on the board of three different railroads, I believe.

And he decided that he wanted to help them put in a railroad.

He put in a very unique three foot and two foot gauge dual gauge narrow gauge railroad, and started buying locomotives and rolling stock to donate to the organization.

Ancr: John Edris likes to reminisce about his first meeting with Elliot Donnelly, who bankrolled the museum in its early days.

John: A big tall guy, hole burned in his hat, hair stuck out, ragged as a barrel of kraut, introduced me as Elliott Donnelly.

"Listen," he says, "why don't you take one of your key people and yourself and Acre and I, we'll go to dinner tonight."

Around 8 o'clock we took off in his car, with one of my boys here, he was a banker, and off we went to New Buffalo, Michigan, to Little Bohemia.

We parked our carcasses there and started ordering drinks.

And he says, "Why don't you pick up some acreage adjoining your 22 acres," he says.

"Put it in your name so the price don't go to Paris, we'll pick up a hundred, a hundred and fifty acres."

I said, "Well, hell, us guys even buy a railroad tie we're so broke."

He says, "Don't worry about that, I'll start you with $150,000."

Well, we about went under the table and the boy with me.

And as the evening went on he says, "The more I drink, the looser I get with my money."

Well, I made sure the glasses were full to the brim, I'll tell you, that was the waitress.

Before we left, he was going to give us $250,000.

Ancr: Building and maintaining all this has long depended on the dedication of tireless volunteers.

Ted: The backbone of this place is it's volunteers.

We could not operate without them.

Voice: All aboard, Highball Ted: So we've got people that are either, they think, I think most of the people think they were born just a little bit to late.

They want to experience steam and experience a way of life that is past.

Ancr: With seven locomotives, an eclectic mix of rolling stock and four different narrow gauge formats, the Hesston Museum is truly a unique experience for railroading fans both young and old.

Ted: We've got a two foot and three foot narrow gauge railroad which is one of the most unique railroads in the world.

We also have a 14 inch gauge which is a quarter scale sized live steam railroad that was donated by the Elliott Donnelly family of Lake Forest, Illinois.

The inch and a half railroad, the little trains as we call them, are basically built by the fellows that run them and they've got about a mile of track that goes underneath a bridge and back over it.

It's quite a beautiful trip.

Narrow gauge is probably the most rare of any type of train.

Standard gauge you can find passenger cars, cabooses, locomotives.

But narrow gauge was really specialized, and there's a whole lot of it that was scrapped for the war effort or just plain wore out.

One of the locomotives, the CSK which we call it, was built in Czechoslovakia in 1940 for the German war effort.

When the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia they hid the locomotive in a straw stack.

And there it sat through the whole war.

Ancr: This wonderful mix of railroading technology contrastsand cooperates beautifully with the splendors of the museum's natural surroundings.

Ted: We've got a 155 acres that our railroad runs through.

And it's very secluded, it's out in the country, and it just makes for a wonderful ride on the train as you go through these hills and see these beautiful oak trees.

It's just such a trip back in time so that you kind of forget about your life and kind of get lost in the woods and the ride.

Ancr: So, if there's any history buff in you at all, your heart would certainly be warmed by a visit to Indiana's Hesston Steam Museum, a "down home" archive of America's steamy past.

(Whistle) (Whistle) Music Ancr: Most of us have heard of Rosie the Riveter, but how many people have heard of Leah the Telegraph Operator?

If Shirley Burman has her way, the tales of women working on the railroad will become both well known and popular.

As a photographer, Shirley has documented women working on railroads for the past two decades; as an historian, she's traced the role of women in railroading as far back as 1838.

A collection of both her original work and historic photographs from her personal collection can be seen in the book "She's Been Working on the Railroad."

Shirley: The women have worked at just about all the similar jobs that men have held, some in lesser degree though.

The earliest jobs were in the services, cleaning, maintaining.

Then they went from that to the telegraph operators, telegraph agents, they were station agents.

Then they moved in from the services and the telegraphs into the wartimes - World War 1 and 2 - doing whatever the men were doing.

They were trained to replace the men who had gone off to war.

So those jobs could be anywhere from working in the roundhouse, to unloading, right up until today's women are doing everything.

Ancr: As with every other industry, women have had to fight for their equality on the rails.

Today, women can be found working at jobs once held only by men: they're locomotive engineers, brakemen, switchmen, and conductors.

Maybe someday the titles will change to "brake person" or "switch person."

Right now, women are making up for lost time.

It hasn't been easy.

Shirley: Leah Rosenfeld was a friend of my husband.

She was a telegraph operator, a station agent.

She had been denied numerous promotions based on her sex, even though she had the qualifications, the seniority, which is how every job in the railroad is based on seniority.

And so she'd gotten fed up and decided to file this lawsuit against her railroad, the Southern Pacific, and the State of California.

She went to court and took years and years, but she finally won.

Women's protective laws were then overturned and it went throughout the whole United States.

No more discrimination and the title 7 in the civil rights act then really kicked into gear.

That's what she was using as her reason for filing her lawsuit; that you could not discriminate based on sex.

Ancr: Shirley became interested railroading when she was a staff photographer for the California State Parks in 1978.

Shirley: I started out first with getting historical photographs and as we traveled, I went to every museum, no matter how big or little, if it was near a railroad line I would go into the museums and check their files to see if they had anything.

That was the beginning, historical photographs.

And then I thought, well it might be a good idea to also see what artifacts are available.

That was where the pins and buttons and trying to find uniforms, if I couldn't find uniforms, find people who had uniforms.

So the records of how these were constructed, at least I have all of that too.

Ancr: In 1983, she met her husband Richard Steinheimer, the acclaimed railroad photographer.

They traveled together throughout the 80s and 90s, chasing trains and taking award-winning photographs.

Their work can be seen in the book "Whistles Across The Land."

Now, with the help of a grant from Trains Magazine, she is cataloging over 20,000 of Richard's photographic negatives.

Shirley is also the founder of the American Railroad Women Research Project.

Shirley: Well, I've been tape recording, video recording women in railroading, photographing for over 20 years.

The reason that I did it was I saw no other stories about railroad women's history when I enquired, "Where were the books and who was documenting it."

It had not been done.

I was just a little concerned some of these older women from World War 2 were dying off and when I researched the World War 1, there were no stories.

I mean nobody had recorded their experiences, other than what was in magazines.

You know those were all kind of glossed over about what women were doing.

So I decided to get the best and worst of what women were saying.

Spencer: The International Society for the Preservation of Women in Railroading has made Shirley their first inductee into the Silver Spike Hall of Fame.

Well that's it for this episode.

Please join us next time for more, Tracks Ahead.

Music Ancr: Tracks Ahead.

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The Model Railroad Division of the Hobby Manufacturers Association.

Helping hobbyists design and build their own miniature railroad empires inside or outside, big or small.

(Whistle) Music