I read this book and thought it was pretty cool! The book is The Rusty Dusty- Great Northern’s Wenatchee-Oroville Branch. It’s written by Mac McCulloch and John E. Langlot. Mac’s name may sound familiar as he is regular forum member here- forum handle is PNWRMNM. He’s a railroader who is always good at explaining railroad things to us non-railroaders. As you might guess, that makes him a very good author as well.
The book is what it sounds like, the history of one little branch line among the hundreds of thousands of miles of rails laid in the USA back when the country was still in expansion mode. You’d think that would make the book appealing only to the locals. You’d be wrong. I read with interest a lot of things about a place and time that I’ll never experience and to me it was fascinating. I wish someone would write a book like this about the rail lines in my area. I have to admit though, history about railroading in my corner of the world might not have been as interesting.
The branch line of the title is in eastern Washington. When I think of eastern Washington, I don’t think of arid desert land, but that’s basically what it is. So here’s the story of a lot of hard working folks who made that area prosperous. Truth be known, we have all eaten apples and probably other produce grown in that area and perhaps shipped by rail.
Telling the story of the branch line unfolds in layers. In order to understand one part, you have to understand the part before and other parts and etc. So Mac and John did an excellent job of telling all the parts and explaining how all the parts fit together.
Any more, I tend to rate my interest in a book by how often it makes me seek out more information on the ol’ internets. This book gets big points from me on that level. I’ve probably followed h