0:09

Hilliards to turn right

0:11

under my hills Ulimart. So

0:14

I'm navigating us to the Roseville Market,

0:16

which has kind of always been my head getting

0:19

dropped off. I'm

0:22

back in Roseville, the place I suspect my

0:24

daughter Ruby hopter first train because

0:26

I want to be on foot inside the yard and

0:28

see what it takes to hop out.

0:32

Mike Brady told me no one owned train hopping.

0:34

Anyone could just head over to Roseville and hop

0:37

a train. But it can't be that easy,

0:40

can't it. Ye kind of a blind turn

0:42

here the

0:44

road. Okay, that's enough. That shut

0:47

up. If I'd learned anything

0:50

riding around the yard with Jonathan Esposito, it

0:52

was that I wouldn't get far on my own. So

0:55

I asked Ruby's friend Zoe, who'd hopped

0:57

trains for seven years, to try to get us

0:59

into as well. It's been a while since I've

1:01

been here, and I don't know where

1:04

the indies and outs are anymore.

1:08

All right, we're turning right at the lake. This

1:11

yard is so big. I

1:14

should have brought my crew change.

1:16

Yea. Zoe's an experienced

1:19

writer. She even has a copy of the crew

1:21

change. This insider map to the rails

1:23

made by hobos. But here in Roseville,

1:26

I'm relying on Zoe vision. Yep,

1:30

here we got we're rolling. We parked the car

1:32

and I realized we're at the same spot

1:34

Jonathan pointed me to when he was driving me

1:36

around. Inside the yard, the little

1:38

park where hobos hop out. There's

1:40

an old tanker car painted white and standing

1:42

on stilts turned into a park sculpture.

1:46

Oh, I see. We walk closer to get a better

1:48

view of it and of the fence around the yard,

1:50

And already there are signs that this is a hop out

1:52

spot for hobos. I'm already

1:54

seeing a ton of train tack. Yeah,

1:58

nasty, sick, sober. Sorry

2:02

Patricia's first ride? Well, how are you doing? Patricia?

2:05

Writers still left messages letting people know

2:07

they'd pass through and if they had a hard

2:09

time getting on a train. I'm

2:12

never where

2:15

does it say that the

2:18

yars are more dangerous than I want to believe. And

2:20

while it's some comfort knowing Ruby's traveling

2:23

family could protect her, I know there's

2:25

more to reckon with once you get on the train. What

2:28

are the risks inside the box car? And

2:30

how do hobos nowhere to go? And when to get off?

2:33

And what happens along the way. I'm

2:38

Deil Morton and this the city of the rail

3:10

probably three

3:14

grains from

3:14

you. So

3:17

yeah, Actually, I think the last time I was here

3:19

hopping out, I remember sort

3:21

of being down underneath

3:23

this tree. There was no fence here.

3:26

After all my travels running around the train

3:28

yard talking to hobos and yard workers,

3:30

there was one last thing I wanted to know. How

3:33

do you hop a train? Ruby's

3:35

friend Zoe is the perfect person to help me try to figure

3:38

this out. She was experienced patients

3:40

and even a little amused to be taking her friend's

3:42

mom to hop a train. Welcome

3:45

to train hopping with the world's oldest Google.

3:50

When I come to Roswell with Jonathan Esposito

3:52

a few months earlier, the place we entered didn't

3:54

have any signs warning us away. Here

3:57

there were plenty saying warning danger

4:00

a road property, remote control trains in

4:02

operation. Closer

4:05

to the chain link fence, I see the holes are too

4:07

small to get a foot in and climb over the top.

4:10

But Zoe, she saw the way through it. Yeah,

4:13

we're talking. Oh there's a hole. There's a

4:15

hole just big enough to get your body through. Okay,

4:18

So there's like a a four

4:20

ft drop from here, and

4:22

once inside the yard, were trespassing, a

4:25

crime that the railroads can take seriously.

4:28

The rails have a private police force they employed

4:30

to protect the trains. Hobos call them

4:32

bulls, and in the yard, bulls

4:34

can do pretty much whatever they want. I've

4:36

heard sometimes they just wave you away and tell you

4:38

they'll arrest you if they ever see you again. But

4:41

if they catch you on the train and think you may

4:43

have tampered with it or the cargo, that's

4:46

a felony. So as much as I wanted

4:48

to do this, I was getting pretty anty.

4:51

Right are

4:53

there cameras everywhere? I

4:55

don't know, do see a camera? I do not see a place

4:57

where a camera. Yeah,

5:00

I don't think that there are cameras. Okay,

5:03

I wouldn't recommend now for

5:05

going through because there's

5:07

a locomotive with people in it

5:09

right up there already.

5:13

I'm questioning, Mike Brodie, could

5:15

anyone really do this? You

5:17

had to be fearless to move through the yard. We

5:19

had to cover the distance from the fence to the box

5:21

car, and the yard was a wide open space.

5:24

Plus, as we heard an episode two, the trains

5:26

can sneak up on you even as a worker.

5:30

But after some waiting, Zoe said, this

5:32

was our movie. Get up. Okay,

5:35

here's the big moment, all

5:44

right, and we're in We're in

5:47

now trespassing pass.

5:50

Things were like, now we're in the danger

5:52

zone. About thirty ft past

5:54

the fence. A train rushes by on a nearby

5:56

track. The train we should get down. SI

5:59

can still see us, I think if

6:02

they're looking looked

6:06

right out of me. I want to hide, but

6:08

I can't, so I just hope the conductor

6:10

doesn't call the cops. I did not make eye contact.

6:15

Even if you didn't see us, I feel like I'm being

6:17

watched. So

6:20

he spots the box car we want about a hundred

6:22

feet away. Oh,

6:25

I see it now. Yeah. The

6:30

other things we're going to have to we're

6:32

gonna have to cross the main lines, so

6:34

you definitely want to look both ways. You

6:38

definitely need to keep an eye out. So

6:42

we're across the tracks from the box car. I can

6:44

see into it, but I can't move,

6:46

so I don't. I think I'm not going to do it. I

6:49

don't think I can do it. I feel

6:52

too exposed. I

6:55

mean, can you describe like what you're

6:57

feeling? What's stopping you from just

7:00

walking closer to it. Uh

7:05

I, uh, I'm stick to

7:07

my stomach and uh

7:10

I'm I'm a little shaky, and

7:12

uh I don't feel strong. I'll

7:16

be I'll be here right with you.

7:18

I won't go any faster or slower than

7:21

you. Z He is so decent. This

7:23

adventure with her reminds me of something Morgan

7:25

told me that people on the rails are kinder

7:28

than you'd expect. Zoe

7:30

is proof of that. So we make

7:32

our way to the box car. All

7:34

right, here we go. We're gonna get arrested. We

7:38

better not. We've better not. I gotta go

7:40

to work tomorrow. And

7:43

finally we're here at the box car. It's

7:46

way bigger than I expected. You made

7:48

it past the first hurdle. Oh

7:51

look, and this is this is the lowest.

7:54

I think this is about the lowest that you'll ever get

7:56

a box car. Really, yeah,

7:58

Look, it's about older length on me.

8:01

Hello, Hello,

8:06

This is what it sounds like inside the box

8:08

car. Wow,

8:12

there's no big space here, and

8:15

it smells like lumber. Do you smell that smell?

8:18

I craned my head into the big hollow space of

8:21

the box car. There's a graffiti on

8:23

the inside. And I'm surprised by how high the

8:25

ceiling is. I didn't realize trains

8:27

were this tall. When

8:29

you stand next to the train, it's to two stories

8:31

tall above you, right, it's

8:34

high. Yea. So

8:37

how do you host yourself up into the box cars?

8:39

It takes muscle. I can't believe you guys did

8:42

this all the time. I mean, I have it from a distance.

8:44

I feel like I feel a sort of feeling

8:46

of the freedom of it. But the actual

8:48

mechanics of getting into the train are

8:51

hard. This

8:53

is really a tough thing. What

8:56

could I get up into the box car? I

8:59

can not gonna be the box car. And my

9:02

friend who CC rider, who's

9:04

about your size, she carried a bucket

9:06

with her. Did you have a bucket? I

9:09

was impressed. I could see just how

9:11

brave my daughter had to be to climb onto one

9:13

of these. And then what so

9:16

have you read into box cars like this? Sure? Where

9:19

do you sit? Ideally?

9:21

You sit where if

9:23

you're traveling this direction, you

9:26

want to sit on this side to keep the wind

9:28

out of your face. That's clean face

9:30

versus dirty face. So

9:32

wherever the wind's not blowing, the

9:36

box goes are terrible,

9:38

right, all right, we got some sound

9:40

it's here. If that means that it's airing up, well,

9:43

I don't know. I don't know where that came from.

9:45

So if that train was leaving,

9:47

it was time for us to go. I could have to work

9:49

my way up to the box cars

9:53

getting in it. We

9:56

did this the tame way, sneaking up to

9:58

a stationary car and even and

10:00

it was too much for me. But in most

10:02

stories I had heard people ran after

10:04

moving trains and caught them on the fly. That

10:07

sounded ridiculous to me. Catching

10:10

on the fly could kill you. It was much

10:12

safer to get on a stationary train. But

10:15

just like that train writer and Mike Brodie's photo running

10:17

to catch a train with a guitar sling on his back,

10:21

sometimes you gotta grab your ship and go. I

10:24

didn't understand the full sequence of actions

10:26

until Alexei would, the hobo who

10:28

described his first ride through the Houston Skyline

10:31

told me how he caught a moving train. I

10:34

mean, if it wasn't moving, you're fine,

10:37

But if it's moving, then it's definitely a whole

10:39

another. And like I know exactly

10:41

how high those things are. It's like it's I have

10:43

to throw my bag up and give a good leap

10:46

and use my upper body strength

10:48

to get up in there. I'm

10:50

six wall in I have a very athletic bill,

10:52

but you know, I was some pretty good health. I

10:56

would just, you know, you just run next to it. You

10:58

grab the ladder and just run

11:00

with it until you get your balance, and then you just kind of like

11:02

swing on so you just

11:04

kind of jump on it and

11:08

kind of lunge, kind of land on the top

11:10

of it with your belly and

11:13

then lift yourself up. That's

11:23

literally how people lose their legs is because

11:26

they can't necessarily stay

11:28

up, you know, so they kind of slide down

11:31

and then they just kind of help into the tracks.

11:34

I know two people who have lost their legs

11:37

from box cars. Such

11:39

a grizzly image. Plenty

11:47

of other writers told tales of people losing their

11:49

fingers or their limbs hopping trains, and

11:52

after walking the yard with Zoe, I don't

11:54

think I agree with Mike. Not just anyone

11:56

could do this. I couldn't

11:58

even get into one that wasn't moving. But

12:01

after cowering next to the box car, I

12:03

had more respect for Ruby. I had

12:05

always known she was a badass, but in

12:07

the yard I realized just how much. But

12:11

badasses aren't invincible, and

12:13

for a traveler, getting on the train is

12:15

just the first hurdle. So

12:34

you've made it past the fence and avoided the yard

12:36

workers, drones, and rail cops. But

12:39

once you're on the train, so many things

12:41

can happen along the ride. Talking

12:43

with veteran writers like Ceci and Cherry led

12:45

me to Thomas Wolfe, who had written all over America

12:48

and had tons of stories and a lot of near

12:50

death experiences too. Those

12:52

are the kinds of stories and mother loves to hear

12:56

going to die. Right. We're all destiny.

12:58

It's just just no exception to that rule.

13:01

So the thing to do is

13:03

just it's important. What's not

13:05

not important while you're alive, because

13:07

you only got one chance at it. Lots

13:09

of hub As adopted ship happens mentality

13:12

as a way of accepting how things go wrong.

13:15

For wolf the risks were just a part of the ride,

13:17

and the danger enhanced the beauty. Wolf

13:20

even found something beautiful about the day he

13:22

almost died in

13:24

Montana. Wont through one of those tunnels

13:27

out there, and uh, the

13:29

invention the universe should and it

13:31

just filled up with diesel fuels. We

13:37

couldn't see anything but the little light on the console.

13:40

It's like, you know, getting

13:43

light headed, odes of water and I think we're gonna

13:45

get gas to death. It

13:52

seemed like forever at

13:54

that dead we could he trying to hold your bath.

13:57

Yeah, yeah, we're just holding hands because we're sure

13:59

we both gonna die. But

14:06

then it came out of the tunnel opened, all

14:08

the air gone out, all the teams die

14:10

out. It

14:17

was a close call. But moments

14:19

like these are why some Hobos told me they

14:21

learned more about their companions in one week

14:23

on the rails than they knew about some members

14:25

of their families. Many Hobos

14:27

see their near death experiences this way

14:30

with a sense of romance. For

14:32

Wolf, as long as he didn't die, it was a good

14:34

experience and a good story,

14:37

the story of making it through the

14:39

story of nearly dying. But

14:43

once you're on the train, the danger inside the box

14:46

car isn't the only hazard. You could

14:48

still get caught on the train by the cops. And

14:51

it's not just bulls outside the yard.

14:53

A lot of local police don't like writers either,

14:56

and some cops have reputations because of the

14:58

rough way they handled writers, and

15:00

every writer has a cop story. I met

15:02

Danny Dean through Morgan. He's the boyfriend

15:05

she mentioned traveling with last episode. When

15:08

Danny and I talked, he told me about an encounter

15:10

he had in Roosevelt with one of those notorious

15:12

cops. I wasn't

15:15

even doing nothing, honestly

15:17

except taking a nap. He decided

15:19

to wake me up. And they also didn't

15:22

warn me about Officer Flood. A

15:25

lot of other writers had stories to tell about

15:27

Officer David Flood. It was pretty

15:29

tough on the travelers he found around the train yard.

15:32

What happened with you in Flood? I

15:34

mean, I've actually been trying to get Fled

15:36

to talk to me. He's such a famous figure

15:39

in that yard. You know who

15:41

Flood is? Yeah,

15:43

oh man. I wasn't even

15:45

doing nothing, honestly

15:48

except taking a nap from the bridge,

15:50

and he decided to wake me up. He

15:53

was being a little fucking handy with me, you know, like

15:55

rough. He like twitched my handback

15:58

and put in handcuffs. I was like, that's I

16:00

noticed you's in that glove song. He's trying

16:02

to go through my pockets. But I'm a

16:04

traveler, so I have like a hundred pockets

16:06

and giving time. Danny

16:09

was sick of this treatment and he'd been minding his

16:11

own business, so he decided to fight

16:13

dirty. So I pissed myself.

16:19

Yes, I was basically trying

16:21

to piss on his hands, and

16:23

I was like, hey, hey, you feel that, And

16:26

yeah, he got mad and he put my

16:28

head in the back of this fucking control

16:30

car and it took me

16:33

to jail. Get

16:37

Another place where the cops are infamous is New

16:39

Orleans. According to writers, the cops

16:42

there could arrest you for just about anything, and

16:44

if there wasn't a law in the books, they could

16:47

make what up. This could lead to all

16:49

kinds of inventive charges. Morgan

16:51

encountered some of those traveling

16:53

kids all knew this, these little stories about

16:55

how the cops in New Orleans, so if they think you're

16:57

doing something wrong, they can write a ticket for whatever they

17:00

want. One of them was the obstruction

17:02

of the flight path of a pigeon, and

17:06

which was heard that Yeah,

17:09

one was the molestation of a chief

17:12

burger. But the one that

17:14

I heard also was leading it with intent

17:16

to fall. Getting

17:18

caught on the train could mean much moorse than a

17:20

ticket. Or a night in jail. You

17:22

could get pulled off in the wrong place, and

17:24

that could lead to a lot more trouble. Zoe

17:27

told me about a time she got pulled off in the desert.

17:30

She was already dealing with the heat when things

17:32

took a turn for the worse. Gotten

17:35

on a on a train and

17:38

sat on it, and the train just didn't

17:40

move until the sun was just

17:42

beating down on me. It was a

17:45

hot, hot day in New Mexico, and

17:48

I'm just roasting in the sun, like

17:50

praying that all these

17:52

workers are zipping by on a t v

17:55

s, just praying that they don't see me as

17:57

being so hot and thirsty. But he

17:59

didn't have any water. I had water, but you

18:02

know, I can't really like sit

18:04

up to drink it. Zoe

18:07

knew if she sat up to get a drink of water, those

18:09

passing workers might call the bulls on her.

18:12

On that train, we did end up getting out

18:14

of the yard without being seen, and

18:18

just for like twenty minutes later

18:20

to go past an elevated work camp

18:22

and have a bunch of workers see us and call the cops.

18:24

And we got left

18:26

in the middle of nowhere in the desert. But

18:30

when the cop pulled Zoe and her friends off the train.

18:32

He didn't arrest them, he stranded

18:34

them in the desert, and just

18:36

before he left he tried to scare them off the rails

18:39

for good. And the cop

18:41

that had taken us off the train was

18:44

saying, like trying to say all this like mean

18:46

nasty stuff about how

18:49

we'd probably like die of exposure

18:52

out there, and we were in such

18:54

a hostile environment. There's

18:56

like, you know, all sorts of

18:58

snakes and squa rampeans, and

19:00

then like local people like we could be

19:02

on res land and they could shoot us,

19:05

like some horrible things. Stuck

19:07

in the desert, Zoe was forced to face another major

19:09

challenge of train hopping, having

19:12

enough supplies, the group

19:14

was running out of water. In that situation,

19:16

well, first we spent a night

19:19

by the tracks because we thought maybe something else

19:22

would stop, but trains rolled past too fast

19:24

to get on all night long. And then the next

19:26

day we're like, well we just have to walk until

19:28

we see something. And how many whiles did

19:31

you have to walk? I don't remember. I mean,

19:33

the people are traveling with weren't super

19:35

great, but we

19:37

were like running out of water at

19:40

that point. We

19:43

finally, like, I saw a

19:46

farmhouse in

19:48

the distance, and

19:52

uh, everybody

19:55

was too scared to go ask them

19:57

for water. They made me go do it because

20:00

that was the girl. Of

20:03

course, as the only woman in the group, Zoe

20:05

was the one that did the work of begging for water.

20:08

So alone, Zoe approached the house. I

20:12

knocked on the door and the person that opened

20:14

the door was a Mennonite woman and

20:16

she didn't say a word to me. I was like, hey,

20:18

I need some water, and I'm like filthy

20:21

and look crazy, and

20:24

it was a wordless transaction. She like motioned

20:26

for me to come into the house. She grabbed

20:28

my water jug, she filled it up, She

20:31

gave me some pamphlets on being

20:33

a Mennonite, and then closed

20:35

the door behind me. Set

20:38

me on my wife. Even

20:42

if you calculated the right amount of water to bring,

20:45

if people you were traveling with aren't smart about

20:47

it or experienced enough, you would pay

20:49

the price. The

20:55

rails are a small world, and in this tiny

20:58

society, Google's could make everything worse.

21:00

Morgan told me last episode about how hobos

21:03

would ditch Google's whenever they could, and

21:05

getting left behind could have big consequences,

21:08

especially when the weather starts turning cold. Four

21:14

months after Ruby left, she called and asked

21:16

if I could send her some of her sweaters. Ruby

21:19

was in Tennessee and it was cold. Of

21:22

course I could. I'd do it right away.

21:25

She'd never ask for anything while she was on the road,

21:28

so here I had a chance to do something for her.

21:31

I gathered up her sweaters and jackets, thinking

21:33

about everything else I wanted to stuff into that

21:36

box. New underwear, socks,

21:38

chapstick, face wipes, shampoo and

21:40

conditioner, hand sanitizer, long John's

21:43

sunblock, fingerless gloves, homemade

21:45

chockat chip cookies, and an envelope

21:47

full of cash. I

21:50

was grinning at the post office, imagining

21:52

her cozy in these sweaters, hams warmed

21:54

in these gloves, passing around her favorite

21:56

cookies, a little touch of love from

21:58

home. By

22:02

the time I was done, the box costs a hundred

22:04

dollars to ship. I would

22:06

have spent more than that for the chance to be her

22:08

mom again. A

22:13

week later, Ruby called from a friend's phone,

22:15

ecstatic and grateful. She loved

22:17

everything in the box. She and her friends

22:19

sat around as she unpacked layer after layer.

22:22

Now they were enjoying the chocol ship cookies.

22:25

Later they were going to get all suited up and go to the

22:27

grocery store and have a feast, and

22:29

everyone would be warm. Because

22:31

she had given away most of the box. I

22:35

was stunned. I had meant those

22:37

things for her, all of them.

22:39

When I was picking through the thrift store and racing

22:42

around the aisles of Old Navy, I wasn't

22:44

thinking of clothing every hobo in Tennessee.

22:49

It took me until the next day to understand how

22:51

wrong I was. Ruby carried

22:53

just as much as she needed, not five

22:55

sweaters and four jackets playing

22:58

that would be a burden. Now everyone

23:00

was warm.

23:03

This world was pushing me to rethink all sorts

23:05

of things. Sure, I used to think

23:07

I was generous giving dinner to anyone who

23:09

showed up at my doorstep. But that was

23:11

a formal kind of generosity where I risked

23:13

very little. When we gave away

23:16

these warm clothes. Her generosity was

23:18

more intimate. She put

23:20

herself at risk so that everyone could be comfortable,

23:23

and of course it was only a little bit of comfort,

23:26

because riding trains was never all that comfortable.

23:29

Then maybe I had to rethink my idea about

23:31

comfort too. You know, I

23:33

has known people that how

23:36

could people do this for years, even

23:39

trying to get to sleep in a box car. Thomas

23:41

Wolfe explained it to me. So see

23:43

you continue like when you're riding, can you

23:46

sleep in that box because I hear it is people

23:48

told me it is like super noisy. Right.

23:53

Oh, it's another one of those really beautiful things.

23:56

As you'r dozing off, all these sounds of it makes

23:59

it's almost like sings to you. What

24:03

what kind of a song is it sing? Yeah,

24:06

I mean it's it's not really

24:08

anything discernible. You know, it's point

24:10

where you're just about to fall off, you're not

24:13

really asleep, and then all those creaking

24:15

sounds and the talk of talking poka all that,

24:17

it's just like it's singing. As some piece it's

24:20

called the Hopo was older. You know that clack clack clack

24:22

on the railroad text it's

24:25

called the Hogo is lullaby.

24:29

Yeah right, it's one of the best, one of my favorite

24:31

songs. Every

24:37

Dalbo

24:43

love as

24:52

beautiful as Thomas makes it sound. Chain

24:55

hopping isn't easy. You really have to

24:57

want it to go through the gauntlet of this world,

25:00

getting caught by the cops, running out

25:02

of food or water, traveling with Google's who

25:04

slowed you down, or being stuck in a car with

25:06

a gas leak. These were just some of

25:08

the risk you could face once you got in the box car.

25:12

But getting on the train and surviving the trip

25:14

are just steps one and two. The

25:16

final step was knowing when and

25:18

where to get off. Experienced

25:22

writers have insider dollars that helps them navigate

25:25

and time their journeys just right. There's

25:28

a guide, a document passed

25:30

from hand to hand among veteran riders, and

25:33

I really wanted to copy. Wog's

25:36

like me are not supposed to be let in on those secrets,

25:39

but hell, I'm going to try. Hey,

25:56

I'm getting back stuff out of the trunk,

26:00

I'm gonna go in there. And

26:07

after my trip to Roosevelt with Zoe, it was clear

26:09

I wasn't cut out for the hobo life. And

26:11

even if I had gotten up in the box car, my

26:13

conversations with travelers like Thomas Wolfe

26:16

showed me just how difficult it was

26:18

to survive. Most

26:20

of the time, I just walk

26:23

past the mailbox right

26:26

say it's

26:29

a lucky there when I think the chances that are it

26:32

is in there. But there was a book only

26:34

held by a few that could give me

26:36

that insider knowledge. It was

26:38

the secret map to the City of the Rails. Lucky

26:42

recipient. A

26:44

copy it

26:47

would be elusive, the much

26:50

desired. For a week,

26:52

I've been checking my mailbox waiting for the package

26:54

to arrive. I'm

27:04

hoping it in my head. Finally

27:10

I had it, The Crew Change

27:12

Guide. I

27:15

can't open it here in the bobby.

27:21

It's a suit of the moment. M

27:24

M. I

27:27

suppose how small it is. On

27:30

my way up to my apartment, I anticipated

27:32

what I'd find in the pages of this guy. The

27:35

Crew Changes, a sacred document, both

27:37

cherished and scoffed at. Many of

27:40

the hoboes I've spoken to had strong opinions

27:42

about it one way or the other, and certainly

27:44

that's something an outsider like me often gets to

27:46

say. But here I was. It's

27:48

got to stab if I holding

27:51

a beat up old copy. Wow

27:55

is that really tiny? Type? Wow?

28:00

YEA. From what I've been told,

28:02

the Crew Change contained practical advice.

28:05

For example, Morgan told me about a

28:07

time she used the Crew Change to figure out where

28:09

to jump off before her train entered the yard.

28:12

I've never felt something the way I felt when

28:14

I completed my first train ride,

28:16

and I was a little nervous because I had to jump

28:19

off on the fly, which means while

28:21

it's still going, then

28:23

you're supposed to run right when your feet in the

28:25

ground with the direction of the

28:27

train. So I remember throwing my pack

28:29

and I just knew right in that moment I had to go

28:31

right then, and I jumped, and

28:36

it's it's like I knew I was supposed to run,

28:39

but I couldn't, and I just tumbled,

28:41

tumbled, tumble, tumble, tumble down, and it

28:43

was all bruised up. What happened

28:46

next felt like a scene straight out of a movie. I

28:52

remember going and it's

28:54

in the crew change, and this was the magical.

28:56

This is just one of those little magical things in

29:02

the crew change. If you read where

29:05

you get off at the spot, it talks about

29:07

a peanut man and

29:10

how there's if you walk down this road

29:13

and through the trees and there's there's

29:15

you know, trees on either side of you, and you you'll get to

29:17

this corner and there'll be a peanut man, a man

29:19

selling peanuts, and you'll go up

29:22

to him and he'll know that you're a train hopper

29:24

and he'll give you some peanuts and

29:26

then you go here to wash up, and then

29:29

and then onto the next stop. And

29:31

I remember seeing that peanut man and

29:34

it being like, holy shit, it

29:37

feels like Lord of the Rings. Yeah,

29:39

it was no, seriously, like that's what it

29:42

feels like. I was on this grand adventure

29:44

to nowhere. I had no actual

29:48

from Morgan. The crew change was magical. It

29:51

was great luck that she had it with her, especially

29:53

when she was first starting out. But

29:55

Mike Bradie explained that it was actually more

29:57

practical than magical. Explains

30:00

to the crew change where too, how

30:03

to get that train yard and naviget that train yard and

30:06

what trains are going where. However,

30:08

it's just a guide, so tons of people take it as

30:10

like a freaking like accurate

30:12

bible. So it's like weird. So it's like this cultural

30:15

thing where people just like really think it's like fact.

30:18

But people have just collectively put

30:20

that information together for

30:22

decades. The hobos who contribute to the Crew Change

30:25

report changes in the layout of yards and increases

30:27

in yard security. Before the

30:30

Internet, hobos communicated through symbols

30:32

scrawled on the undersides of bridges, warnings

30:34

that there were mean cops in the yard, or a

30:37

tip for a house close by where you could get some food

30:39

or use the telephone. My favorite

30:41

is the one that let other writers know sad

30:44

story will get you dinner. That's

30:46

me. Some of those marketings

30:49

still exist on the edges of train yards, like

30:51

the graffiti tanker I saw with Zoe, but

30:53

the Crew Change is much more specific, and

30:56

national writers like Mike

30:58

send these yard updates to the Crew Chage List

31:00

ser a digital version of the same network.

31:03

But even though he's contributed to the crew Change,

31:05

Mike says he's outgrown it. I

31:08

have the new change guid yea

31:11

because I contributed to it. Oh

31:13

wow, I'd love to see it. I'm gonna do. I'm

31:15

gonna do a video though, where I light it on fire. So

31:17

I don't because next time I go

31:19

train hopping, I'm not bringing it. I don't need it. You

31:22

can probably tell where this is going. We'll

31:24

give you send me a copy of it. I'll make you

31:26

a copy. Okay, okay. If

31:31

the Royal Road name is underlined, it indicates

31:33

a mainline. But holding it in my hands, the

31:35

crew change didn't look how I expected. If

31:38

the railroad name is not underlining,

31:41

I suppose Morgan's peanut Man had me imagining

31:43

a booklet with mystical creatures drawed in the

31:46

margins, or a steampunk aesthetic

31:48

with old Western type. But the crew

31:50

change is all business. How do you live

31:52

things up in here? Major

31:56

long distance routs with crew change

31:59

points from I understood how valuable

32:01

the crew change could be to a new writer, But a veteran

32:03

writer like Mike didn't need it. And

32:06

there are things the crew change could never teach you.

32:08

Even experienced writers might spend a few months

32:11

with the older writers to pick up some tricks. Terry

32:15

introduced me to another experienced writer, her

32:18

ex boyfriend, whose train name was Cheddar.

32:21

Cheddar told me that after more than a decade

32:23

of writing, he agreed to travel with the notorious

32:26

hobo Dirty Mike to see what else he could

32:28

learn. You know, he

32:30

actually no ship

32:33

you. He did definitely show

32:35

me some hop

32:37

out spots and showed

32:39

me some good sign flying

32:42

spots to make money throughout the country. You

32:44

know what I mean that I was not aware of before I

32:46

had traveled with him. So yeah, he definitely

32:48

took me to a few of his own super

32:50

secret spots, you know, like showed

32:53

like good spots to get a kicked down, good spots

32:55

to make a buck, good spots to catch a train.

32:57

You know, Cheddar saw Mike's

33:00

experience firsthand when they hopped off a train.

33:04

We get to the spot and we jump off our train,

33:06

and he's like, I'll be right back, and

33:08

he be lines off into the bushes and I kind of just meandered

33:11

after him a little bit, and uh, he's

33:13

off frummaging around in the bushes and he procures

33:16

like a barbecue grill and

33:18

and it chugg of water and he's

33:20

like, all right, now, we gotta go up the street. And uh.

33:23

We went to this like dumpster and we dumpstered

33:26

all this food and came back and we

33:28

had like a flat out like started

33:30

a little wood fire and his little webbard

33:32

grilling at and had a little barbecue

33:35

right there next to the railroad tracks and drink

33:37

beer. It was fun. It was It was a cool

33:40

It was a cool impression that I got from. I

33:42

was like, Wow, I see that stuff

33:44

stashed all over the country, right,

33:46

and he could roll into all these different

33:48

spots. And that was my thought

33:50

on the matter. I'm like, wow, man, I wonder

33:53

if this guy's got it like this everywhere you

33:55

know. This

33:59

was a lead level Oboeing Durning my

34:01

head, a network so deep and well organized

34:03

that he had barbecue stashed and major train

34:05

yards across the country, but those wouldn't

34:07

be in the crew change. Only Jurning, Mike

34:10

and those he traveled with would know. My

34:17

journey into the rail yard started out as a search for

34:19

my daughter. I was trying to understand the

34:21

life that Ruby chose and her odds of surviving.

34:26

Because I learned what it takes and got to know the people

34:28

on both sides of the tracks, I felt

34:30

myself getting pulled in. Every

34:32

question I asked led me to another question,

34:35

to another unforgettable character, and

34:37

to another train yard full of secrets. My

34:41

constant worry about Ruby didn't go away. But

34:44

there was something else motivating me now, six

34:46

months after she left, A curiosity

34:49

about the city of the Rails, a curiosity

34:51

that was quickly growing into an obsession. This

34:57

search had revealed a world hiding in plain

34:59

sight, and if I was going to really understand

35:01

it, I knew where I had to go next. Here's

35:04

Alaska, So if I could find California,

35:11

Colton, Colton

35:15

West, Colton Yard is it. A lot of the hobo's

35:18

I met kept bringing up Colton, like

35:20

Colton, Like who gives the funk about Colton, California?

35:22

Right? Like like what the

35:25

fund is West Colton? But to a

35:27

train rider, West Colton is

35:30

the capital city, you

35:33

know through West

35:36

Colton is a capital city for tramps.

35:38

It is. There's a capital city

35:40

for tramps. I've got to know more. There's

35:43

so many big railroad cities like Chicago

35:45

and Minneapolis. Why was Colton the

35:48

capital? Pretty much every

35:50

hobo I met had some crazy story about

35:52

Colton. From what I was hearing, it

35:54

sounded more like the Wild West. The bullet

35:56

passed in and out of my hat twice and grazed

35:59

my head and the other one went through

36:01

my back, Like you're a girl by yourself,

36:03

what you're gonna do about it? And I was like, oh yeah,

36:06

I'm And I yelled dirty my name.

36:08

She comes growning up. So David

36:11

Colton, he's the proof of the adage to live outside

36:13

the law, you must be honest, at least with each other

36:16

department. No suspects were contacted.

36:19

So there's a lot that's missing here. There's a lot that's redacted.

36:22

What exactly is going on in Colton and

36:25

why on earth is this the capital city for tramps.

36:28

I've never heard that in the years

36:30

I've been here. Um doubt.

36:34

Does South Side Colton Gang

36:37

exist? Yes, that's

36:40

next episode on City of the Rails

37:08

as well be drinking gastle, Look

37:13

what you've done. The

37:18

City of the Rails is hosted and written by me

37:21

Daniel Morton and developed in partnership

37:23

between Flip Turn Studios and I Heart Podcasts.

37:26

I think we got it all wrong? Call in and

37:28

tell us at seven oh seven six

37:31

three oh three, three nine and leave

37:34

a message. That's also the place

37:36

for questions, comments, criticisms, original

37:38

songs. Whatever you think we should know, we

37:41

might use it on the show at

37:43

I Heart. Our team is executive producer

37:45

and showrunner Julian Weller, Senior

37:47

producer and editing master Abouza

37:49

far and our excellent producers Emily

37:51

maronof Shina Ozaki and Zoey

37:53

Denkla, with production support from Marci

37:56

to Pina. Excellent original

37:58

music every episode by Aaron Kaufman.

38:00

Our theme music is Wayfaring Stranger, performed

38:03

by Profane Sass thanks to Scott

38:05

Michaud at Flail Records. Our

38:08

logo is by Lucy Quingtonia and uses

38:10

a photograph by Mike Brody. Thanks

38:13

to Thomas Wolfe for your stoicism and for

38:15

your poetry, and to Danny Dean

38:17

for quite a colorful story. Zoe.

38:20

I couldn't have done it without you, and I didn't

38:22

even do it, Alexei. You're

38:24

right, there's got to be something better than

38:26

this garbage. Our

38:29

executive producer at flip turn is Mark Healey

38:31

at I Heart. Thanks to Nikki Tore and

38:34

Deathann Michalouso. If you want

38:36

to follow along, find us on Instagram at

38:38

flip turn Pods. We'll be back

38:40

next week in Colton, California, The Hobo

38:43

Capital on the City of the Rails,

38:53

the story of making it through the story

38:55

of nearly dying. Okay,

38:57

I think that's enough choices, Julian, or

39:00

you can Frankenstein it and say, well,

39:03

hey, these two words from over

39:05

here and this pause

39:07

from here and this inhalation

39:10

from here and call

39:13

it a day.