We have already viewed the last five years of the railway steam era in Ontario and Quebec through the lens of Jim Guerin. His photography has been featured in three Encounters volumes so far. Two of those covered Ontario in 1954-1955 and 1956-59, while one of them was centred around Montreal on two trips there in 1956 and 1958.

All the while Guerin was framing the final half decade of the railway steam era in Ontario and Quebec, he was making forays into the Northeastern United States. In fact, on one occasion, he drove all the way to Florida.

So, it's time to fill in the portrayal of the final years of steam in North America with a volume featuring Jim Guerin's photography in the United States between 1955 and 1959. This book will nestle in with our three works featuring his photography on the Canadian side.

Here is but a brief sampling of some of the material available from Jim Guerin on his trips in the United States in the latter half of the 1950s. Whichever side of the border he captured, he had the same eye for composition of the overall scene, equipment, and details beyond a locomotive. Thus, his portraits are of interest to scale modellers of the time period and also those of us who appreciate being immersed in the whole scene, to lose ourselves in an escape, in chance encounters with steam—and diesel—in the United States:

Baltimore & Ohio Mikado 4600 at the engine terminal in Willard, Ohio in April 1955.

New York Central Mohawk 3105 on the turntable at Toledo, Ohio in April 1955.

Seaboard Air Line rare E4A passenger unit (built 1939) heading an accommodation at Palm Beach, Florida in June 1956.

Sadness at Roanoke in June 1956, with dead Virginian Railway Berkshire 507, Pacific 212, Mikado 459, and more.

Chesapeake & Ohio GP7 5826 leading a sister during a surge in coal traffic at Lynchburg, Virginia in August 1956.

Nickel Plate Road PA-1 crossing the diamond with a passenger train at Painesville, Ohio in September 1956.

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