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I've always considered myself lucky to have spent some time in southern Japan in the 1969-71 time frame when steam was still active on some JNR lines. The station and roundhouse people were always friendly and I got some great pics. Exactly where they are amongst all my stuff I'm not sure, but I'd like to find them so I can get 'em put on a CD. 

Originally Posted by Hot Water:
Originally Posted by Burlington Route:

Neat, too bad we can't get that in our country!

So, you didn't make to the various California State Railroad Museum Rail Fairs?


No, been to california as a kid, saw the cable cars run, the redwoods and alot of the beaches up highway 1...but nothing like that. Locally, we've gone to IRM and rode the thomas train{not real} and rode a few other engines{real ones}...saw the freedom train here in otwn eons ago as well as the last steamer roughly 12yra ago that ran thru town...but that's it.

Well, one reason that we "can't get that in our country" is that European railways were

government-owned (originally or eventually), and had a much more responsible attitude toward preserving a bit of what was done and where it came from. And there is a culture

that expects it.

 

Here? Hah. Everything's always been for sale. Everything. No buyer? Junk it. "That's

progress." Hah. That's destruction.

 

Not really.  Thanks to the former "planned" economy, most of those were still found on Polish revenue lines well into the 80s and early 90s.  Lot easier to save something thats still in service and maintained. 

 

Ask someone in Great Britian sometime how its possible that None of the 100 or so battleships built in the Late 19th/ 20th century were perserved?  The only capitol ship present at the surrender of the High Seas Fleet in 1918, that still exists, is the USS Texas.  None of the great ships of WW2, other than a single light cruiser, was saved either. Thats history lost, and thats sad.  

 

Frankly, in the 20 or so years following WW2, no one anywhere was interested in saving history, wanting just to forget it, and its artifacts.  American steam fell into that period.  Sic transit gloria . . .

Ah, you miss the point about asking some one in GREAT BRITIAN?  Legendary ships like Warspite, Rodney, King George V, Duke of York, Renown, Invincible . . .

 

Which of course, makes my point.  THe US saved these ships, as well as the Alabama and North Carolina.  The 4 Iowa class came up for preservation in the 1990s, and were eagerly aquired.  In the 1940s and 50s, ships and locomotives all over the world were scrapped left and right because no one at THAT time was interested.

Last edited by Drydock
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