The VIA Rail Book Awards!

The VIA Rail bookshelf is a very short one. Notwithstanding books featuring photos of VIA Rail by McDonnell, Wilson, Coo's guides and many others, or books on aspects of VIA Rail like Canadian Sunset (above), until I began work on the first of my four books on VIA Rail in October, 2010 there were only four! Four!! In this post, my initial goal was to highlight a new book and try to fit it into the existing bookshelf based on its content.

But wait...as I tried to do so, I once again realized that no two of the published books on my personal VIA Rail bookshelf shared exactly the same focus. Each one was in some way different, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. So instead, consider this a meeting of the VIA book club - this club pertains solely to this one micro-niche topic. Everyone gets an award. I feel a bit like a nepo-baby giving myself an award, but I will stay humble. (I have wondered for a long time whether a political candidate votes for himself or herself.) I should actually feel more like Oprah, "You get one, and you get one!" And the awards go to - in order of publication - with author surname, title, year of publication, initial selling price, AWARD! and notes.

• Nelligan - VIA Rail: The First Five Years, 1982. $15. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE VERY FIRST BOOK ON VIA RAIL AWARD. It was not common, in the early 1980s, to have as much colour as Tom Nelligan had in this book. Cross-Canada coverage of a time when, like an invading army coming ashore, VIA was in its most vulnerable position.

• Lewis - Rail Canada, Volume 4, 1983. $35? THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE FIRST BOOK ON VIA RAIL'S FLEET AWARD. Consists, cars, specs and even some colour, though listing measurements in millimetres was often a source of controversy.

• Greenlaw - MBI/Voyageur Press railroad color history of VIA Rail, 2007. $45. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE BEST CORPORATE HISTORY BOOK ON VIA RAIL AWARD. In this post, I profiled my meeting with Chris to have my copy of his book signed, and we met again when he picked up one of my books! The political and business elements of VIA's history have been captured nowhere else in this level of detail.

• Shron - Turbotrain: A Journey, 2007. $25. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE BEST SINGLE-TRAIN  BOOK ON VIA RAIL AWARD. We didn't get a Tempo book until much later, though the prolific Kevin J. Holland's treatment Hawker-Siddeley unique technology followed a similar path, moving from CN to VIA ownership.

• Gagnon - Trackside with VIA - The First 35 Years, 2011. $25 (*initial price, without shipping). THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE FIRST BOOK ON VIA RAIL CONSISTS AWARD. No other book has 2,700 consists, and probably never will. Born from a 78-page spreadsheet!

• Gagnon - Trackside with VIA: Cross-Canada Compendium and Cross-Canada Compendium Consist Companion, 2012. $30* and $8*, respectively. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE FIRST BOOK THAT GOT TOO BIG TO BE JUST ONE BOOK AWARD. Now I know what it's like to expect one baby and find out it's twins!

• Holland - VIA in Color - The First 25 Years, 2013. $59.95. Here's a post. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE BEST ALL-COLOUR TOUR OF VIA BOOK AWARD. As appraised by Jakob Mueller: "If you have any of Eric Gagnon's books, get this book. Conversely, if you get this book and want to learn more about the equipment you are seeing, get Eric's books." Colour printing and Morning Sun Books' stable of subjects resulted in a full-colour finish.
  

• Gagnon - Trackside with VIA: Research and Recollections, 2017. $30. THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE FIRST BOOK ON VIA RAIL TO HAVE THE WORD RESEARCH IN ITS TITLE AWARD. None of my books were the work of just one creator. I was fortunate to have valued contributors contributing for all four: Schuff, Perry, Bohi, Boyko, Sampson, Hayman, Box, McQueen, Mueller and Shron. Each contributor had contributed his own time spent on research, photography and time trackside as I did.

• Holland - People Moving People: The History of VIA Rail Canada, 2022. $79.95. Here's a publicizing post.  THE TRACKSIDE TREASURE BEST COFFEE TABLE BOOK ON VIA RAIL AWARD. Forty years after Nelligan. State-of-the-art book! The Rapido Trains live video on this book included the phrase, "Eric Gagnon has printed a few things". I've always chuckled at that one - not just for the somewhat-awkward mention, but also for the closed captioning mis-handling of my name! Now 31% off MSRP! 

and now...

Longpre' - The Cars of VIA Volume 1, 2024. $124.95. 

Just advertised in the past week for pre-order. In the author's own words, "I'm a part time railway consultant, buying and selling railway passenger cars & parts, "TheSleeper Line" reporting marks SLCX. In the 1990s, I have purchased and sold over 70 passenger cars, mostly retired VIA Rail passenger equipment, and some ex-CN auxiliary cars." Rapido says he’s owned 84 different real passenger cars at various times in the last 20 years, the first car in 1990. Jason Shron posted on Dec 16/01, "Has anyone thought to preserve a Tempo coach or a passenger RS18?", to which the author replied, "I had to scrap many ex CN/VIA "E" and "Green" sleepers back six years ago, because I had no takers back then. Now, I receive calls on occasions from folks looking for these cars. My answer is this: if you think it should be preserved, buy them while they're available. Don't count on anyone else but you." Things have really changed in the ensuing 23 years since that question and answer. Jason Shron has progressed from a student of art to a manufacturer of model trains. He has also successfully parlayed his admiration for all things VIA into a VIA Historical Association (VHA). 

It truly takes more than one person to create books of this scope. Assembling photos from various sources (see below on that one!) such as railway archives and trackside photographers sometimes has a prohibitive cost attached. It's an up-front cost that has to be recouped once the book goes on sale. It's also a cost that scares many away from 'doing that book I've been working on'. So having Rapido Trains Inc. and the VHA as part of these two most recent books' production and marketing has to be a big help. In the author's own words, "a Morning Sun book costs .55 cents per page, while The Cars of VIA costs .42 cents per page. I could have sold it on my own for $100.00, but instead I chose to sell it for $125.00 allowing retailers to buy and sell them in-store, which reduces the profit margin considerably. Finally, I've invested 16 years of my life so far and over $20,000 in photographic material, research and various road trips."

Sample photos of the book from the Rapido Trains Inc. website:

Skyline detail, though date of reversal is listed as "early-1980s".

Volume one of eight - time-line for others TBD. Set aside $1,000!

Car-by-car granular detail:

This volume covers about 85 cars out of VIA's 900+ car fleet. Eight volumes are planned, though I'm not sure why anyone would shroud mystery with misinformation....?

And...an early mockup?

The search for photos for this new book became mired in mists of a mystifying miasma five years ago, one that reached your humble blogger. An unsettling one that I first found out about from Pinterest, a social media set-up that bills itself as a "visual discovery engine for finding ideas like recipes, home and style inspiration, and more" and in my case, a place to warehouse photos I find online, for personal, modelling purposes. Places like ebay, where a copy/save puts a sale item image (not a slide!) into my Pinterest page.

In September, 2019 an email landed in my inbox, including the excerpt (RL) and my reply (EG) thereto (below, ending with the final word from Pinterest which accurately adjudicated the intended claim of ownership of photos for this book was indeed not a valid one made as by the author). In spite of the action taken against me to try to land three strikes against me using my Pinterest account, I'm still using Pinterest!

RL: I noticed that you are continuously taking Ebay Kodachrome slide previews to post them on Pinterest. It happens that I purchased some of these for my book. Once sold, these become the property of the buyer for their personal use or for future work such as the book I'm presently writing. I have placed a removal request with Pinterest for some of them. If this continues, I shall take further actions to stop this. There will be at least four volumes with over 2500 pictures. First volume should be completed by the beginning of next year [2020]. I respect your blog, please respect my book and its contents by removing any photographic material that you don't own on Pinterest or any other web site. Please act accordingly.

EG: Your email is unclear as to how I, or anyone else, can possibly know who 'owns' a photo before it's posted and then sold on ebay, especially since ebay sellers routinely sell slide duplicates which are then bought by multiple buyers. I'm glad that you respect my blog but others routinely copy and paste photos from Trackside Treasure to Pinterest. I am both flattered and frustrated by this, but I have decided not to waste time pursuing and threatening them as you have done. Why are you choosing to do this?

EG to Pinterest: Please let me know if I'm interpreting Pinterest and Ebay copyright policies incorrectly. I have read both and am participating in good faith. I can foresee Richard submitting similar complaints in future and I believe I should enjoy Pinterest without threats from Richard such as these.

Pinterest to EG: Eric [another Eric!](Pinterest Support): We have received your counter-notice. After review, we have removed the strike against your account.

The end - Fin.

Of course, I want to support all book creators and their projects. Especially when it comes to books on VIA Rail, of which there were arguably only ten. And though I am neither a shill nor shelter for other creators, I am an ardent aficionado that claims this corner of cyberspace as my own, free to praise, pillory and put up with my fellow enthusiasts as I see fit on a daily basis. 

Running extra...

Tim's still travellin'! Check out Tim Hayman's third instalment of his trip aboard VIA's Canadian this summer. Tim is so right when he praises the river canyons of British Columbia, in some ways more scenic than the even the Rockies on the CN line through Jasper.

Sharp-eyed readers. You are wanted here at Trackside Treasure! Nearly a month ago, I inconspicuously inserted an 'Easter Egg' into what I call the boilerplate language at the top of this blog's right sidebar. It was August 15, and my thinking was...does anyone actually read this stuff?

On September 9, I got my answer. It was a yes. Not a resounding yes, nor an instantaneous yes, but a yes nonetheless:

Congratulations! Your prize awaits!