In this album of black-and-white photographs, a people-oriented treatment of steam locomotives is favored over an obsession with mechanical detailia that tends to overwhelm photo collections of railroading. Dramatic shots of smoking machines hurtling down the line are de rigueur in any album, but Withuhn's selections and captions stress the quotidian meaning of steam engines in the three decades before diesels and autos triumphed: they were the economic lifeline.