Railroading
the Hardware, the Landscape, and the People
​Current venue:
Widmann Gallery, King's College -- Wilkes-Barre, Pa.
January 8th-29th, 2025
Meet the artist, Friday, January 17th, 5-8 p.m.
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Past venues:
Gallery 425 -- Williamsport, Pa.
November 2018
Steamtown National Historic Site -- Scranton, Pa.
December 2018 through March 2019
Sunbury Market House -- Sunbury, Pa.
May 2019
Station Gallery -- Lock Haven, Pa.
June-July 2019
Dietrich Theater -- Tunkhannock, Pa.
Part of “Trains and Breakers”, July-November 2019
Community Cup * -- Towanda, Pa.
November 2019-July 2020
Greenwood's Furniture * -- Tunkhannock, Pa.
November 2019-July 2020
* Thanks to the Kitson Arts Alliance for arranging these
venues (half of the show at each)
Silk Mill Apartments -- Bloomsburg, Pa.
Winter-Spring 2021 (not publicly accessible)
Walk-In Art Center -- Schuylkill Haven, Pa.
July-August 2021
Tamaqua Arts Center -- Tamaqua, Pa.
October 2021
Bloomsburg Public Library -- 225 Market Street, Bloomsburg, Pa.
November-December, 2021
Ricketts Cidery -- 4360 Red Rock Road, Benton, Pa.
February-April 2022
Blough-Weis Library, Susquehanna University -- Selinsgrove, Pa.
May-September 2022
Bill's House Community Room -- Bloomsburg, Pa.
Summer 2024 (limited access; contact the artist for details)
Each of the images in the current exhibition appears below, along with the artist's bio and caption information as it appears on the wall of each gallery. Past versions of “Railroading” have included some of these images and many others; if you have seen the show before, it looks very different now, at the fifteenth venue since it began traveling in Autumn 2018 .
Born in the Bronx in 1965, Oren B. Helbok missed the age of steam on our nation’s railroads, but that doesn’t stop him from trying to relive it where and when possible. Although he ran away from a steam locomotive the first time he saw one, at age 2, he quickly reversed course, and since 1972 he has photographed and ridden steam trains from approximately coast to coast.
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Oren’s father, John, gave him his first camera, and his second one, and his third and fourth, all of them using film. John taught Oren the technical aspects of developing and printing; Oren learned composition from his father and from the many, many books and magazines about trains that he pored over starting before he could read. Oren’s mother, Miriam, also aided and abetted her son’s passion, including by taking trips across Canada and around the British Isles by train.
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After having children starting in the late 1990s, Oren took a decade-plus-long break from “serious” photography (he took many thousands of snapshots of the kids during that time) before starting up again, with a borrowed digital camera, in 2009, and he never went back to film. Since late 2015, he and his Nikon DSLR have spent almost 125 days at trackside. No longer working in a darkroom, Oren uses free, downloadable GIMP software – “the poor man’s Photoshop” – and lets others do his printing. Among his many influences, Oren counts American “art” photographers Walker Evans and David Plowden and less-well-known “railfan” photographers Jim Shaughnessy, Phil Hastings, and Richard Steinheimer. Oren thanks the hundreds of people – railroaders, other fans and photographers, friends, and strangers – who have helped and shown kindness through the years.
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Since moving to central Pennsylvania in 1992, Oren has worked as a carpenter, furniture-maker, zoning officer, and independent school administrator; he now directs the non-profit Exchange, which he helped found in 2009 on Main Street in Bloomsburg. In 2001, Oren and his wife, potter Sara Baker, joined a dozen other artists to open the Artspace Gallery, and he served as its first treasurer; he has also served on numerous non-profit boards, and for two years in the 1990s he volunteered at Steamtown, in the restoration shop and in train service. Oren lives with his family on East 5th Street in Bloom, within easy bicycling distance of almost everything.
Reading & Northern No. 425
Hometown Trestle, Pa.
16 October 2016
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Not visible from any road and requiring a mile-long walk to photograph, the 160-foot-high, 900-foot-long Hometown Trestle surely qualifies as one of the most spectacular and underappreciated railroad landmarks in Pennsylvania. The current structure, the second on this alignment, dates back to 1931; designed for an increase in traffic that never happened, the trestle bents have room to support a second track, but the Central Railroad of New Jersey never needed to add it and, bankrupt in 1972, pulled out of Pennsylvania entirely.
Black River & Western No. 60
Copper Hill, N.J.
2 April 2022
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I grew up on the B. R. & W.: My father and I started visiting regularly in 1970, and we spent countless days photographing their steam-powered passenger trains and riding their diesel-powered freights, all the while learning from the professional and volunteer railroaders who made us welcome. In the Spring of 2022, the volunteers ran a photo special; thanks to a couple of other photographers’ efforts cutting trees, this view of the bridge over the Third Neshanic River looked better than it had in fifty years.
Reading & Northern No. 425
West Hamburg, Pa.
24 December 2019
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Just over the hill from this location, the Cabela’s store attracts six million visitors a year — but the real action in the neighborhood takes place along the
half mile of Lowland Road where it parallels the former Reading main line. To make this photo, I asked my son, Jem, to drive, and I hung out of the passenger window with the camera’s shutter set to 1/40th of a second, the blur capturing the drama of a steam locomotive’s machinery at speed.
Central of New Jersey No. 113
CP MINE, Schuylkill Haven, Pa.
1 December 2019
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The Philadelphia & Reading and the Mine Hill & Schuylkill Haven railroads built their main lines by the mid-1840s, among the earliest in the U.S., with their junction just north of downtown Schuylkill Haven. Nowadays, the Reading & Northern may earn as much from storing cars on the lines as from moving coal on them, and passenger trains only run when Project 113 hauls Santa or the Easter Bunny and their fans.
Strasburg Rail Road No. 475
Lancaster County, Pa.
21 January 2024
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On a cloudless and very cold Sunday, the Strasburg’s 4-8-0 pulls the 1 p.m. train up the grade approaching Esbenshade Road as a fresh breeze out of the northwest pushes No. 475’s exhaust down and across the snow-covered field, obscuring the coaches and trees and only adding to the beauty of the scene.
Abandoned Illinois Central coal docks
Gilman, Illinois
16 April 2022
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These coal docks on the onetime “Main Line of Mid-America” (then and now the route of the City of New Orleans) last serviced steam locomotives close to two-thirds of a century ago.
Do you think that a photograph can qualify as “moody” even if made in full sunlight? This scene evokes a mood in me — contemplative, nostalgic, and sad. What about y'all?
Strasburg Rail Road engineer Ross Gochenaur in the
snow at Groff's Grove
9 December 2017
Nothing beats steam in the snow, when the elemental forces of fire and steam meet the elemental forces of air and ice. This day had started gray and cold, but by noontime the snow fell with increasing intensity, making me very happy. The crews on the trains dealt with it as they always have, mostly uncomplaining; the poets among them, Ross foremost, also gloried in the experience.
Engineer Ross Gochenaur
Strasburg Rail Road
9 December 2017
The Strasburg bills itself as “America’s Oldest Shortline”, chartered in 1832 and in more-or-less continuous operation since sometime later in the 1830s (for the first decade and a half, with horses supplying the motive power). Halfway along the 4½-mile line, the current owners built a passing siding in the late 1960s so they could operate two trains. The uphill, westbound, train always stops here to let the downhill eastbound go by; Ross has his Train 2 well in control as he meets Train 1 at 1:39 p.m.
Strasburg engineer Ross Gochenaur
East Strasburg, Pa.
24 February 2018
A Strasburg employee for twenty years, beginning on the Monday after he finished high school, Ross worked in the airbrake shop and as a conductor, fireman, and engineer on the railroad’s passenger and freight trains. While not a railfan when he started there, he became deeply knowledgeable about steam railroading in all of its aspects and deeply passionate about it; now a part-time employee, he does not take for granted that he gets to put his hands on locomotive throttles.
Strasburg Rail Road No. 89
East Strasburg, Pa.
16 February 2019
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On the first day of the 2019 operating season, engineer Rick Musser backed No. 89 out of the enginehouse for the last time as a Strasburg Rail Road employee: At the end of the next week he would retire after more than 30 years with the company. To mark the occasion, his 20-something son, Ryan, served as his fireman.
Reading & Northern No. 425
Tamaqua, Pa.
16 October 2016
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This image owes its inspiration to the great Jim Shaughnessy and his photograph of the last run of the Boston & Maine’s No. 3713 (now under restoration at Steamtown) in Massachusetts in 1956. As Shaughnessy had done, I chased the 425 to this location, jumped out of the car, and panned the camera at the speed of the train, capturing the feeling of motion — and the emotion of the moment.
R. & N. fireman Chuck Trusdell
No. 425 north of Reading, Pa.
13 October 2018
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The harder a steam locomotive works, the more draft the exhaust produces, providing more air to the fire, producing more heat to burn more coal to make more steam – a virtuous circle which makes a fireman’s job somewhat easier. He still has to shovel all of that coal, but at least he can feel confident that it will burn. At night, the light from the firebox provides virtually all of the illumination in the cab.
W. W. & F. fireman Pete Stevens
Sheepscot, Maine
9 October 2023
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On Columbus Day 2023, the Wiscasset, Waterville and Farmington Railway Museum ran pumpkin-picking trains to SeaLyon Farm, making up for the ones cancelled on Saturday, the 7th, due to rain. That afternoon, before the run to Top of Mountain to bring the last trainload of happy passengers back to the real world, fireman Pete Stevens filled up No. 9’s water tank.
W. W. & F. conductor J. B. Smith
Alna Center, Maine
5 February 2022
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The all-volunteer Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum operates little trains on a little piece of the long-gone network of two-foot-gauge railroads in Maine, and it does so in an almost 100% authentic manner: Only a few details of the crews’ clothing and the occasional water bottle or lunch cooler betray these scenes as the 21st century and not the first decades of the 20th.
W. W. & F. conductor J. B. Smith and crew
Sheepscot, Maine
5 February 2022
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The original Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington operated from 1894 until 1933; then the tracks got torn up, but much of the right-of-way remained with a successor company, and a local man named Harry Percival bought that company and all of its assets in 1985. Now the non-profit organization that Harry founded has three miles of railroad in operation and an unparalleled collection of equipment from all of the Maine two-foot-gauge railroads — a combination of ShangriLa and Brigadoon.
W. W. & F. southbound train
Approaching Alna Center, Maine
5 February 2022
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On my first two visits to the W. W. & F., I spent most of the days riding the trains, and on the second I spent almost all of every trip outside, on the coaches’ platforms. I do not take for granted the trust that the volunteers showed in me, allowing me that privilege — most railroads insist on every passenger riding inside, seated — and a photo like this one represents my joy in the experience as much as the glory of steam railroading on a freezing cold and sunny day.
W. W. & F. crew switching
Sheepscot, Maine
5 February 2022
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After years of seeing friends’ photos made at the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum, I finally visited in the summer of 2021, and I instantly fell in love: In addition to the photographic possibilities, I met the friendliest and most welcoming people I could have ever hoped for, and I have made the thousand-mile round trip six more times, with another planned for February 1st this year. Scenes like this make every mile worthwhile.
Steamtown engineer Chris LaBar
Scranton, Pa.
28 August 2016
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In 1968, the great railroad photographer Richard Steinheimer made an image of a Colorado & Southern enginehouse worker in Leadville, Colo.,
opening the doors to reveal an SD9 diesel. When Chris LaBar opened the Steamtown roundhouse doors on this morning in 2016, no locomotive yet sat out on the turntable, but this image takes 100% of its inspiration from Stein’s masterpiece.
Jerry Dziedzic and Mike Oprisko
Steamtown roundhouse, Scranton, Pa.
28 August 2016
Even indoors, early mornings and late afternoons make for the best lighting, as here in the Steamtown roundhouse as the sun pours its rays through the giant windows while the crew — one a volunteer and the other an employee of the National Park Service — gets Baldwin 0-6-0 No. 26 ready for its day hauling passengers through the yard and up to the
Nay Aug Gorge.
Baldwin Locomotive Works No. 26
Steamtown yard, Scranton, Pa.
28 August 2016
Early on a summer morning, the roundhouse crew has finished their ministrations, and the engineer and fireman bring the day’s star attraction out to the yard to pick up their train for “Nay Aug Limited” trips. The ancient sandhouse tower appears above the engine, while in the distance the former Delaware, Lackawanna & Western locomotive shops provide an Industrial-era horizon.
Reading & Northern No. 425 crossing
the Peacock’s Lock Bridge
7 October 2017
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Built before the Civil War by the Philadelphia & Reading as part of the first double-track mainline railroad in the United States, this bridge just north of the city of Reading used to span the Schuylkill Canal as well as the river of the same name; the bridge draws its name from a long-vanished lock on the canal, which itself went out of business in 1931, having lost most of its traffic to the railroad more than half a century earlier.
Frisco No. 1630 engineer Chris Chasin
Union, Ill.
14 June 2024
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The Illinois Railway Museum has the largest collection of rail equipment in North America (more than 500 pieces) and a five-mile-long fully-signalled main line operated and maintained almost entirely by volunteers — one of the premier you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it preservation sites anywhere. On a hot Friday afternoon, the Museum’s ex-St. Louis-San Francisco 2-10-0 led a passenger train towards the depot and a recreation of a Railway Post Office pickup and drop-off. You have to see it to believe it.
J. Neils No. 5 fireman Joey Ferrito
Union, Ill.
14 June 2024
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In a locomotive cab, not only does one get up close and very personal with the machinery, one gets to see the interaction of the crew with the machinery. Without constant attention from the fireman, the fire and water just will not make the steam that the engineer needs. And just as the fireman must provide steam for the engineer, the engineer must not overtax the fireman's ability to provide that steam. On an unseasonably hot Friday afternoon, Joey looked at least taxed, if not overtaxed.
R. & N. volunteer Keith Strobel
Pittston Junction, Pa.
17 August 2024
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An engineer on Amtrak in New York City during the week, Keith Strobel has spent many weekends for many years in the steam shop of the Reading & Northern in Port Clinton, Pa., and for his efforts he gets to accompany the railroad’s steam locomotives on their excursions. In 2024, for the first time, ex-Reading Company 2102 led trips to Tunkhannock and Pittston, and during the layover on one of them I caught Keith in a characteristic pose, lubricating the big 4-8-4’s running gear.
Bob Kimmel and Mike Fenstermaker
Schuylkill Haven, Pa.
28 September 2019
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Two of Railway Restoration Project 113’s volunteers take a break on the back footboards of their locomotive during the annual Borough Day celebration, when the 113 comes to Haven and boils water all day so visitors can blow the whistle. The two men have known each other for decades, working together on steam trains; at the time of this photo, they had gone a day and a half without much sleep.
Project 113 volunteer Bernie Perch
Schuylkill Haven, Pa.
28 September 2019
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Bernie Perch’s experience with steam began at the Wanamaker, Kempton & Southern in Berks County, Pa., where he learned to fire and run their locomotives. Now retired from a teaching career, Bernie puts his woodworking skills to good use making patterns for all sorts of locomotive parts that will get cast in various metals; on the 113, these include everything from the firebox grates to the whistle. His heroic pose here reflects his status as one of all-volunteer Project 113’s indispensable members.
Project 113 engineer Mike Fenstermaker
Minersville, Pa.
3 December 2017
Mike had his first experience working on steam back in the mid1970s, when as a ten-year-old he got lowered into a cold locomotive boiler to clean out rust and scale. (None of the adult volunteers could fit, or so they told him.)
Kneeling at the Altar of Steam
Sheepscot, Maine
11 February 2023
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More than fifty years after picking up a camera, I have not in the slightest lost the thrill that I feel in the presence of steam locomotives, and I have many friends who share my fascination and excitement. John Riley, on the left here, entered the world in the year 2000, and he and I met in 2018; Richard Boylan, on the right, has chased trains with me since 1968. None of us will ever forget the gloriously cold and clear winter day that we spent together on the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington in 2023.
W. W. & F. volunteer Johnny Piwowarski
Sheepscot, Maine
8 October 2023
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Do you know of any organization that starts counting volunteer hours by people still too young to go to kindergarten? The Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum does — one of the reasons that it very quickly became one of my very favorite places when I first visited in 2021. I met Johnny at age 3½; by 5½ he had already accumulated a few hundred hours, and I look forward to watching him grow up as a valued member of the W. W. & F. family.
The Decisive Moment
Lancaster County, Pa.
17 December 2023
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The family drove out from Rockville Center, N.Y., to ride the Strasburg and to watch trains. As I waited to photograph one at Esbenshade Road, they caught my eye. “Do you mind if I take a picture of y’all?” I asked the mother. “Oh, go right ahead,” she said. “My photogenic one,” she added, pointing to the older boy, the one on the roof. As the locomotive went by, the younger boy lost his interest in me and watched the train; the older boy also watched the locomotive, and then he turned back to me.
Click.
Drive wheel of Steam Into History #17
New Freedom, Pa.
23 December 2017
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To make this photo, I held onto the locomotive’s grab iron with one hand, leaned out as far as I could, and held the camera with the other hand, aiming as much by sense of smell as anything. Using a slow shutter speed emphasized the motion of the wheels and siderods, and I could count on the camera’s built-in vibration control — an example of modern technology making imagemaking possible that almost never could have happened in the past.
Self-portrait in Shadows, Steam, and Snow
Alna Center, Maine
5 February 2022
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On the first day of the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington’s 2022 operating season, I got an invitation from one of the volunteers to ride the
trains, and I did not turn it down; close to five hours later, as the last train of the day from Top of the Mountain slowed for its stop at Alna Center, I saw the long shadows of the locomotive, its exhaust, and the coach on whose platform I rode, and I had just enough time to capture the scene before the foreground filled with brush and trees.