Terry Pindell (born [ when? ]) is an American travel writer known primarily for three North American 'rail odysseys', through the US, Canada and Mexico, each of which became the subject of a travel book. He has also written a book on migration within the United States. The Toledo Blade said of his first book, Making Tracks: "Not since John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley has anyone put together a better story about America on the road." [1]
A New Hampshire resident, Pindell is a former English teacher and mayoral candidate in Keene, NH. He is the grandson of a railroad engineer. [2]
A transcontinental railroad or transcontinental railway is contiguous railroad trackage, that crosses a continental land mass and has terminals at different oceans or continental borders. Such networks can be via the tracks of either a single railroad or over those owned or controlled by multiple railway companies along a continuous route. Although Europe is crisscrossed by railways, the railroads within Europe are usually not considered transcontinental, with the possible exception of the historic Orient Express. Transcontinental railroads helped open up interior regions of continents not previously colonized to exploration and settlement that would not otherwise have been feasible. In many cases they also formed the backbones of cross-country passenger and freight transportation networks. Many of them continue to have an important role in freight transportation and some like the Trans-Siberian Railway even have passenger trains going from one end to the other.
Inter-city rail services are express trains that run services that connect cities over longer distances than commuter or regional trains. They include rail services that are neither short-distance commuter rail trains within one city area nor slow regional rail trains stopping at all stations and covering local journeys only. An inter-city train is typically an express train with limited stops and comfortable carriages to serve long-distance travel.
Via Rail Canada Inc., operating as Via Rail or Via, is a Canadian national transportation agency. It is a Crown corporation that operates intercity passenger rail service in Canada.
The Grand Trunk Western Railroad Company was an American subsidiary of the Grand Trunk Railway, later of the Canadian National Railway operating in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. Since a corporate restructuring in 1971, the railroad has been under CN's subsidiary holding company, the Grand Trunk Corporation. Grand Trunk Western's routes are part of CN's Michigan Division. Its primary mainline between Chicago and Port Huron, Michigan serves as a connection between railroad interchanges in Chicago and rail lines in eastern Canada and the Northeastern United States. The railroad's extensive trackage in Detroit and across southern Michigan has made it an essential link for the automotive industry as a hauler of parts and automobiles from manufacturing plants.
Michigan Services are three Amtrak passenger rail routes connecting Chicago, Illinois with the Michigan cities of Grand Rapids, Port Huron, and Pontiac, and stations en route. The group falls under the Amtrak Midwest brand and is a component of the Midwest Regional Rail Initiative.
A snowplow is a device intended for mounting on a vehicle, used for removing snow and ice from outdoor surfaces, typically those serving transportation purposes. Although this term is often used to refer to vehicles mounting such devices, more accurately they are known as winter service vehicles, especially in areas that regularly receive large amounts of snow every year, or in specific environments such as airfields. In other cases, pickup trucks and front end loaders are outfitted with attachments to fulfill this purpose. Some regions that do not frequently see snow may use graders to remove compacted snow and ice off the streets. Snowplows can also be mounted on rail cars or locomotives to clear railway tracks.
Robert Lorne Hunter was a Canadian environmentalist, journalist, author and politician. He was a member of the Don't Make a Wave Committee in 1969, and a co-founder of Greenpeace in 1971 and its first president. He led the first on-sea anti-whaling campaigns in the world, against Russian and Australian whalers, which helped lead to the ban on commercial whaling. He campaigned against nuclear testing, the Canadian seal hunt and later, climate change with his book Thermageddon: Countdown to 2030. He was named by Time as one of the "Eco-Heroes" of the 20th century.
Anthony Lander Horwitz was an American journalist and author who wrote articles and several books. He won the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. He wrote about subjects including American history and society.
Charles R. Pellegrino is an American writer, the author of several books related to science and archaeology, including Return to Sodom and Gomorrah, Ghosts of the Titanic, Unearthing Atlantis, and Ghosts of Vesuvius. Pellegrino falsely claimed to have earned a PhD, and errors in his book The Last Train from Hiroshima (2010) prompted its publisher to withdraw it within a few months of publication.
Michigan Central Station is the historic former main intercity passenger rail station in Detroit, Michigan. Built for the Michigan Central Railroad, it replaced the original depot in downtown Detroit, which had been shuttered after a major fire on December 26, 1913, forcing the still unfinished station into early service. Formally dedicated on January 4, 1914, the station remained open for business until January 6, 1988, when Amtrak service was relocated. The station building consisted of a train depot and a 230-foot office tower with thirteen stories above two mezzanine levels. The tallest rail station in the world at the time of its construction, the Beaux-Arts style architecture was designed by architects who had previously worked on Grand Central Terminal in New York City.
Mexico has a freight railway system owned by the national government and operated by various entities under concessions (charters) granted by the national government. The railway system provides freight and passenger service throughout the country, connecting major industrial centers with ports and with rail connections at the United States border. Passenger rail services were limited to a number of tourist trains between 1997, when Ferrocarriles Nacionales de México suspended service, and 2008, when Ferrocarril Suburbano de la Zona Metropolitana de México inaugurated Mexico's first commuter rail service between Mexico City and the State of Mexico. This is not including the Mexico City Metro, which started service in 1969.
The Toledo, Peoria and Western Railway is a short line railroad that operates 247 miles (398 km) of track from Mapleton, Illinois, through Peoria across Illinois to Logansport, Indiana. TP&W has trackage rights between Galesburg, Illinois, and Peoria, between Logansport and Kokomo, Indiana, and between Reynolds, Indiana, and Lafayette, Indiana. TPW has connections with UP, BNSF, NS, CSXT, CN, CP, BL, CERA, CIM, KBSR and T&P. The railroad is now owned by Genesee & Wyoming Inc. The railroad's traffic comes largely from agricultural products, including both raw and processed grain products, as well as chemicals and completed tractors. The TPW hauled around 26,000 carloads in 2008.
Martin Luther King Jr. Plaza is the main passenger rail and intercity bus station of Toledo, Ohio.
Cleveland Lakefront Station is an Amtrak train station at North Coast Harbor in Cleveland, Ohio. The current station was built in 1977 to provide service to the Lake Shore Limited route, which was reinstated by Amtrak via Cleveland and Toledo in 1975. It replaced service to Cleveland Union Terminal. Lakefront Station is located in downtown Cleveland near the Lake Erie waterfront, adjacent to the Cleveland Memorial Shoreway and in the immediate vicinity of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Great Lakes Science Center, the Steamship William G. Mather Museum and Cleveland Browns Stadium. The station has had little to no renovation since its opening.
Thomas "Yonnie" Licavoli was an American gangster and bootlegger during Prohibition. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Licavoli, along with brother Peter Joseph Licavoli and cousin James Licavoli, worked with Jewish gangsters to take over illegal gambling in St. Louis. The Licavolis soon moved on to Detroit, Michigan and would control criminal operations in Detroit and Toledo, Ohio, throughout the Prohibition era.
Elizabeth Graver is an American writer and academic.
The Lake Cities was a daily passenger train operated by Amtrak between Chicago, Illinois and Toledo, Ohio via Detroit, Michigan. It operated from 1980 until 2004, when it was folded into the Wolverine. It replaced the St. Clair, a Chicago–Detroit train which operated in tandem with the Wolverine. The extension to Toledo gave travelers in Michigan the opportunity to connect with eastbound trains such as the Lake Shore Limited without backtracking to Chicago. Amtrak re-routed the train from Toledo to Pontiac, Michigan in 1995.
Larry Tye is an American non-fiction author and journalist known for his biographies of notable Americans including Edward Bernays (1999) Satchel Paige (2009), Robert F. Kennedy (2016) and Joseph McCarthy (2020).
The Niagara Rainbow, known as the Empire State Express before 1976, was an American passenger train service operated by Amtrak between New York City and Detroit via Buffalo and Southwestern Ontario in Canada. The service ran between October 31, 1974, and January 31, 1979.
The Wabash Railroad was a Class I railroad that operated in the mid-central United States. It served a large area, including track in the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, and Missouri and the province of Ontario. Its primary connections included Chicago, Illinois; Kansas City, Missouri; Detroit, Michigan; Buffalo, New York; St. Louis, Missouri; and Toledo, Ohio.