In 1957, I was in the Air Force, stationed at Francis E. Warren AFB, Cheyenne, WY and going home for the holidays around the 15th of December. I tried to get reservations on the WP and the UP out of Denver, but the trains were all sold out for the holidays. I, and a few other Airmen, then got reservations on the Denver Chief to Los Angeles. Little did I know at the time that the Denver Chief ran from Denver to La Junta, CO., and would drop of my chair car and a sleeper to be attached to the Chief going west to Los Angeles. We, in the chair car, were told that the Chief would be coming through around 1:30AM (I think that was the time). We saw many trains passed by including 2 sections of the Chief. Finally, they attached us to the third section of the Chief. We were 10-12 hours late getting to LA Union Station and the expected welcome home crowd desided it was to late to travel to Union Station. My fellow Airmen all swore that taking a Grayhound would have been faster and less money.

In summer of 1970, my family and I took the Santa Fe Chief, I think, with their new double level cars. My wife and kids had never be on a train, and we were going to see my brother in Gallup, NM. Everything went fine until we left San Bernardino, CA. The aircondition unit for the car broke down and the car temperature must sored to 90 degrees. The train was full enough that the conductor would not attempt to relocate the passengers in our car to other cars in the train. They tried to start the airconditioning unit in Barstow, Needles, Kingman, and Flagstaff with no results. Rather that delay the train, they gave up at each station and sent the train on. Trainmen would come through the train and open the doors of the cars next to our car with the hope of those car's airconditioning units would cool down our car. However, the rail noise from the open doors cause the passengers of those cars to come and close the doors. This went on all night and day - arriving in Gallup around noon. Try sleeping and trying to get a 3 year-old and a 6 year-old to sleep through that, it did not happen. I swore that I would never ride a train again.

Then came AMTRAK. I have had good success and have ridden over a hundred time on the train with AMTRAK and will do so again. Anytime I have a questionable experience on the train I remember back to the good old days, and thank the man above that I do not have to ride anywhere for 10 or more hours at 90+ temperatures, or have to wait in some fair-off station for a connecting train.

The only time I questioned riding AMTRAk was in 1988 when I was traveling to New Orleans and SP kept putting freight trains in Sunset Limited's way. We arrived in New Orleans over 12 hours late. This trip is considered an exception by me because I was riding on the SP rails, on vacation, and did not care when I got to New Orleans.