Reading Railroad's Main Line

Neat to see all the older 40' freight cars with Fallen Flag roadnames that I remember seeing back in the 1950s and '60s.

Some fantastic vintage rolling stock! Those RS3's really stormed along on passenger work m

I'll take an educated guess that the Norristown Interlocking was the track that crossed over Barbadoes Island to the south bank of the Schuylkill river between Bridgeport and Abrams. I used to fish that river and walked by that interlocking tower all the time as a youngster. Great to see the Bridgeport roundhouse! That got torn down by the time I was there. Circa 1970.

I love the Reading Co. and this video makes one very aware of the large variety of 1st generation diesels they had. Great seeing Train Masters at work.

Thanks for sharing this enormously valuable historical footage. The Reading was some railroad!

This is a very amazing vintage train video

Awesome compilation video! Always love to see the old FP's and FT's in action from back in the day. Especially loved the bird's eye view of the Klapperthal curve. I grew up in the outskirts of Reading during the "Bee Line Service" era of the 1960's and eraly 1970's, and can remember being caught many times on one side or the other of the 7th Street cut at Penn St., counting freight cars with my dad as a train passed by. Good memories. Thanks for sharing!

Thank you for yet another trip down memory lane with the Reading RR, when railroading was an American institution, especially the passenger trains. What memories they bring.

Magnificent footage.. love the fact that we're just going to hear the train sound which is magnificent.. did I mention it was magnificent.. hypnotic.. thanks

Thanks for sharing!! Great video! Probably most all of this is gone!☹️

This is just amazing. Cab units, A-B sets, even a pair of Alco FA and B! I mean this is just unbelievable. I grew up in Reading in the late 80s and 90s - I know Wernersville, Womesldorf, Birdsboro - so many locations I remember watching Conrail trains as a boy. As an adult, I model Reading. This gives me such perspective - and such a longing for decades gone by. And Klapperthal Curve by air! OMG! Thank you so much - please keep up the good work, if you find anymore!

Boy, that wuzza good one... I used it to jam along and to keep my guitar plunking sharp and fresh... cheers

Thanks for sharing great footage of the early diesel locomotive days

What a video is this! All early diesel types and not yet a single GE in sight, this must be the 50's, maybe just after the end of steam, as there was even an FT A&B set. And it seems all different models were used on passengers as well, EMD, Alco or Baldwin, it just doesn't matter. And it seems that even the RS3's had steam heat boilers on them, as I saw one passenger with steam escaping from underneath the cars and then I noticed the stack behind the cab on the short hood which must be the boiler exhaust. Great work with the dubbing of the sound as well, it's spot on.

That is some amazing stuff!!! Thanks for posting!!!

If this footage was on DVD or Blu-Ray, I would certainly buy it. This is really good material!

Enjoyed the ride on the Reading. Thanks for posting.

Loved it, some great shots in there. Incredible to see all my railfan spots back in their heyday.

Very interesting. My dad was a NYC exec. during some of this period. As teenager, I took many cross country trips to LA to visit relatives. I saw a lot of the 20th Century limited of the late '50s/ early 60s. I did not work in the industry until many years later a partner and I built a railroad freight car leasing business. All of that is background. What fascinated me was seeing the way railroads operated in that era. You can tell that it was am early iteration of diesel power because they were using the locomotives direct substitutes for steam -- turntables. engine houses, length of trains, signaling and number of tracks shows how different it was to run a freight railroad then vs. now (longer, heavier trains, larger more specialized cars, distributed power etc.). I that brief look at the special train hauling steel structural systems (road bridge beams?) was awesome. I wish there had been more of that. I'd love to know something about how that train was put together. The beams resting on the bogeys was genius.

That was terrific! I thoroughly enjoyed that video about the Reading!