Between 1870 and 1950, America's railroads produced a body of poster
work significant both for the artists involved and for the range of
images created. The railroads used this visual medium from their
founding, first in the form of broadsides, dominated by text and
intended to convey practical information, and then, during the 1890s, as
vivid lithographed display posters. For the next 50 years, American
railroads commissioned posters designed to spur the popular imagination
and thereby encourage travel. Images of compelling intensity included
Maurice Logan's icons of the 1920s overland limiteds passing in the
West; Adolph Treidler's wonder cities; Santa Fe's Native Americans; and
Leslie Ragan's and Sascha Maurer's machine-age steamliners.
Although a great deal has been written about European railway and
travel posters, their American counterparts remained in the shadows.
Travel by Train focuses on the artists, railroad men, and advertising
agencies that created and produced the work. It presents the posters in
the context of the historical trends and competitive strategies that
shaped the development of the railroad industry. The book also follows
the development of the advertising business and graphic design in the
U.S. and Europe. It features approximately 160 poster images (many in
color), personal photographs, and sketches, many of them never before
published.
