The Diesel That Did It

Wallace W. Abbey had already embarked on a long career as a participant in and observer of the rail industry when in 1945 he witnessed the arrival of the first Santa Fe FT diesel in Chicago. The teenaged Abbey knew he was seeing the future. Gifted as both a writer and photographer - with an insatiable curiosity about railroading - Abbey spent decades gathering material about the Santa Fe's landmark FT fleet, and this marvelous book is the result.

-- Robert S. McGonigal, Editor, Classic Trains magazine

Abbey's book is a must-read for serious students of dieselization and the constructive disruption it brought to North American railroads. Electro-Motive's FT was a radical new locomotive created by engineers who dreamt a future. Santa Fe was the first railway to grasp the FT's significance: a fleet of 320 units engaged in an industrial duel in the wartime American southwest. Steam was convincingly shoved ingloriously offstage into history's shadows and a permanent past.

-- Michael Iden, P.E., retired Union Pacific motive chief

Yes, this is the story of a locomotive, the FT diesel. But it is also the story of a company, the glorious Santa Fe Railway, that clasped the FT to its bosom and demonstrated during World War II that here was a mighty workhorse. With that, the steam locomotive was doomed. Who but Wally Abbey could spin this tale so well? After all, he grew up with the FT and alongside the Santa Fe and knew and understood both. So sit back and be seduced by Wally's relaxing narrative about a time long ago and a revolutionary locomotive long gone (but not forgotten).

-- Fred W. Frailey, author and longtime Trains magazine columnist