O. Winston Link

Link (left) with some of his equipment, mainly flash reflectors. The guy at right is George Thom, his assistant. It’s 1956.

The railfan world is going ga-ga over the photography of O. Winston Link.
And that’s despite the fact O. Winston Link wasn’t really a railfan.
But —A) he did chronicle the end of steam-locomotive operations on the Norfolk & Western Railroad, and —B) he specialized in night-time photography.

Link’s most famous photograph, the Iaeger (“ee-YAY-grrr”) Drive-in picture, which he titled “Hotshot eastbound,” because the train, lead by Norfolk & Western A 2-6-6-4 articulated #1242, is boomin’-and-zoomin’. (There’s a special story behind this pik. Link’s many flashbulbs wash out the image on the movie-screen, so Link had to take a second image of the movie screen that he could superimpose on his train shot. It’s a trick that could be easily done with Photoshop®, but Photoshop wasn’t around in 1956. Link had to expose both negatives onto his final print, and correctly register the movie-screen. 89 bazilyun tries were required. The final print [above] is from a negative of that successful merge.)

Norfolk & Western was the final holdout for steam locomotion. Other railroads were converting to Diesel-locomotives, but N&W tried to make steam-locomotives work as well as diesels.
This was primarily because steam-locomotives burned coal, and N&W shipped mainly coal.
The railroad served the vast Pocahontas coal-region in Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky, shipping great quantities of coal.

What I consider Link’s best photograph, the railroad crossing at Luray, VA. (That up-in-the-air watchman’s shanty is right out of the ‘50s. Ya don’t see that any more.)

Norfolk & Western finally gave up on steam locomotion in 1960.
Diesel locomotion had advantages.
Diesel fuel could be easily delivered and stored for loading on locomotives, since it was liquid.
Coal required coal tipples, and huge coaling-towers to load the locomotives.
Steam-locomotives were labor intensive, requiring frequent heavy maintenance and inspection. —A steam-locomotive is a pressure-vessel, subject to slamming and heavy vibration.
Diesel-locomotives were like trucks; they didn’t need so much maintenance, not like a steam-engine.
Maintenance expense could be drastically cut, and the army of maintainers cut loose.
A steam-locomotive also needed a person to tend the fire — the fireman.
A diesel didn’t need one, although the railroad crew unions held on for years.
Diesel-electric traction was also much better suited to railroad operation.
Steam-locomotives are more efficient at high speed, but the diesel-electric locomotive is more efficient at low speed, the speeds most railroads operate at — like lugging slowly up grades.
Link was a commercial photographer. He could conceptualize how a photograph would look, and then arrange that.

The famous gas-station picture. It’s an old gravity-feed, and the car is Link’s Buick. The couple are his friends. The location is tiny Vesuvius, VA, and is titled “Sometimes the electricity fails.” (There is an electric pump adjacent.) Locomotive #131 is a K2a Mountain, 4-8-2, northbound pulling passenger-train #2 on the Shenandoah Division.

He also was aware a way of life was passing with the end of steam-locomotive operations.
So he took it upon himself to chronicle the end of steam-locomotive operations on the Norfolk & Western Railroad, the final major railroad operating steam-locomotives in America.
He proposed doing this to Norfolk & Western management, and they went along.

“Hooping” up orders at Waynesboro. The agent at the station delivers train-orders to the head-end crew of Train #2, the “New York Train.” The fireman snags the orders from his passing train. Engine #130 is a K2a Mountain, 4-8-2. It’s lifted its pop-valve.

Link pretty much had the run of things.
Hours would get used setting up a shot.
Shop managers complained he needed four hours setting up a photo that only took five minutes to shoot.
Like a guy cleaning the headlight of a steam-locomotive.
Doing so might only take a minute; but it took Link four hours to set up.

The famous Christmas-tree shot. Father and son are dragging home the family Christmas-tree. That’s #611 atop the bridge; the only J (4-8-4) that survived; and was later run in railfan excursion service. The N&W J was a phenomenal steam-engine; perhaps the best 4-8-4 steam-engine ever made. (Although it only had smallish 70-inch driving-wheels, a concession to N&W’s difficult profile. But it could do over 100 mph; and had all roller-bearings, even in the side-rods.) #611 was retired from revenue service in 1959, and then from excursion service in 1994. I’ve ridden behind it, and chased it a few times. —It had a minor derailment while in excursion service, and Norfolk Southern Railroad (a merger of N&W and Southern Railway) determined it was because track was no longer constructed to operate engines like the J. After that derailment, #611 was limited to 45 mph. When I rode it, before the derailment, we were doing 70+. —I’ve even been in its cab.

Link’s achievement was in taking railroad photography beyond -a) the standard roster-shot (a side-elevation of a locomotive); and -b) the three-quarter view of a passing train.
Link would include the setting the train was passing through, and a human element.

The famous swimming-hole picture. A N&W Y6 (2-8-8-2) is in the background. (A similar picture was taken in daylight, but it’s not as dramatic.) The creek is Hawksbill Creek in Luray, VA.

The hicks and bumpkins that lived out along the railroad were thrilled that someone, not judgmental but with a Brooklyn accent no less, was taking an interest in their lives.
Link would include them in his pictures; e.g. the Popes on their porch, Hester’s living-room, and the father and son dragging the family Christmas-tree.

The famous “Hester’s living-room” picture. Hester Fringer (at right) had a larger living-room window installed, so her family could watch the passing parade of trains. A passing N&W steam-engine is visible outside. Her little boy waves. Three resting cats and a dog are oblivious.

Somewhere in the photograph was a roaring N&W steam-locomotive.

A gathering of gabbing hicks on a porch in Lithia, VA. The participants are oblivious to the passing train.

Link also mastered photography at night; the photographing of large objects in darkness.
At first it was an attempt the control illumination; an offset to the fact daylight always mainly came from the south (in this hemisphere), and therefore wasn’t controllable.
Daylight illumination was always a given; a factor to be considered in the final product.

Ma and Pa Pope watch a passing N&W passenger-train, powered by a J, from their porch in Max Meadows, VA on New Year’s Eve of 1957.

With illumination by flashbulbs, you could put illumination where you wanted it.
Flash photography is usually an offset to poor illumination.
Usually only one flashbulb is used, but Link mastered using hundreds of flashbulbs to illuminate large objects.
He also mastered firing them all off together, and shutter-delay so the shutter would trip at full flashbulb bloom.
Hundreds of flashbulbs required miles of wiring. A picture like the Iaeger Drive-in picture took hours to set up.
His experience photographing the railroad at night translated to his commercial projects.

Father and son watch a N&W passenger-train charge out of one of the railroad’s many tunnels.

And back then you only got one shot. The camera wasn’t shooting multiple frames like they can nowadays.
I don’t know if Link did this, but I’d be tempted to have the train trip the shutter — to not shoot too early.
But how many preliminary shots do you take in daylight to determine the correct train location?
You can’t shoot multiple frames. Link shot multiple photographs at each set-up; e.g. the Luray crossing shot was also taken with an employee.
But at many locations (e.g. Iaeger Drive-in, Pope’s porch, and the Christmas-tree) there’s only one shot.

The “Honey-Hole” picture. The railroad used to keep helpers at the base of the long uphill Blue-Ridge grade into Roanoke. The helper-crews would get off their waiting locos, and access the “Honey-Hole.” —The engine is probably a Y6 articulated (2-8-8-2). The front cylinders were compound, using spent steam from the rear cylinders.

You also have to master getting the multiple flashbulbs to fire simultaneously. There were failures.
Link was an engineer.
He dreamed up solutions to his many problems.
He developed a power-source that fired off the hundreds of flashbulbs together.
Plus he determined the correct shutter delay to trip at full flash-bloom.

The “Lubritorium” picture. The railroad lubricated its locomotives in a “Lubritorium;” a shed where all lubrication greases were dispensed by hoses. An engine could be fully lubricated in minutes. The locomotive is J #605, a 4-8-4. The employee appears to be steam-cleaning the valve-gear.

What Link did has become a legacy, and his chronicling the last steam operated railroad a railfan treat.
A museum of his photographs has been set up in Roanoke, VA, N&W’s shop location, where many of its steam-engines were built.
Many railfan photographers have come and gone since Link, and often do better. (Link died in 2001.)
But Link inadvertently set the direction of railfan photography, despite not being a railfan.

The famous “Shaffer’s Crossing” picture. The railroad had a large coaling-tower, still standing, at this location, and locomotives would assemble there to coal up. In the center is a giant Y6 articulated, 2-8-8-2, and at right is a J class 4-8-4. The coaling-tower could fuel three locomotives at once.

All photographs by O. Winston Link.