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At left:
“The Wedding of
the Rails” pageant
re-enactment of the
1869 driving of
the last spike at
Promontory Point,
Utah, as the Pacific
Railroad is finished.

the all precision and enunciation of a time-and- Researching the title, Walker found plenty of
temperature recording). As the songs and script info about the show, but none about a recording.
blared forth around them, the onstage actors and Since the Fair was home to its own radio station,
singers lip-synched, so that none of those 4,000 rapt the best assumption by Weill experts is that the
audience members missed a word or note. recording was made for broadcast, although there
is no evidence the program ever actually made it
Lost, Then Found on air. The 38-minute recording, capturing about
At the end of October 1940, fairground lights two-thirds of the pageant, was digitally restored,
dimmed, and the New York World’s Fair came to and released on CD by Transcription Records. As
an end. Its shows posted their closing notices. After for those original (and fragile) 16” disks, they now
671 performances, Railroads On Parade had The critics loved it! reside securely in the Stanford Archive of
reached its final destination. A manuscript of Weill’s A 1939 review Recorded Sound.
original score eventually found its way to the Yale sampling for
University Music Library, and an abbreviated con- Railroads On Parade. Train Of Thought
cert suite, based on themes from the score, became an occasional part The souvenir show book for Railroads On
of orchestra repertoires. The actual, ephemeral on-stage experience of Parade heralded the pageant’s purpose:
Railroads On Parade, however, was long forgotten. Until … This is the saga of the American railroad. The mag-
In the early 2000s, Robert Martens ran across home movies of the nificent progress of rail transport in America for the last
Fair, taken by his grandfather, Gustave. Included in them: color footage 110 years. Into every corner of our social and economic
of Railroads On Parade, taken during an actual performance. The brief existence, the railroad is tightly interwoven. It is the backbone of the country.
film (just 5 minutes long) has been beautifully restored and shows a grand Even more, it is its veritable lifeblood. In its 250,000 miles of steel veins, it
selection of moments from the show that critics hailed as “exciting and flows to every far corner of a far-flung land. It binds in its living, throbbing
elaborate,” “most thrilling,” and “a fine stage spectacle.” It’s available on embrace, city and town and village, the open country, the forest, the mine, the
YouTube and is well worth seeing. Since it is a silent movie, an appropri- forge, the factory, and the sea.
ately rousing underscore was added, from Ferde Grofe’s World’s Fair Railroads On Parade tells of what our national rail transport has achieved
Suite. Why? Well, even though Railroads On Parade had been seen by – is still achieving. It presents a picture of a glamorous past, and points toward
more audience members than any of Kurt Weill’s other, more famous a future not less significant. Never more than today, it stands upon a threshold
works, no recording of his music for the “circus opera” existed. Until … of new achievement. A century-old institution of our America adapts itself to
It happens in movies. It happens in storybooks. It never happens in progress, to new ideas for its development, as rapidly as they offer themselves.
real life. The American railroad, if not in its infancy, still is in the full flush of health
Well actually, now and again it does. In 2007, New York collector and strength; it looks forward, not backward. Its opportunities of service to the
Guy Walker, responded to a Craigslist ad for old records and books. American people still are well-nigh unlimited.

Thumbing through the items on offer, Walker ran across four 16”
acetate records marked “Weill—Railroads On Parade.” Where the View the video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WT8piY6kYNo). Relish
deceased previous owner ran across them is anybody’s guess. But now, the recording. Ride the rails, as audiences did over 80 years ago, when Weill and
for just about a dollar a disc, they were Walker’s. Hungerford and company paid tribute to the majestic and magical allure of …
Railroads on Parade!
“Singing through the forest,
Rattling over ridges;
Shooting under arches,
Rumbling over bridges;
Whizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o’er the vale—
Bless me, this is pleasant,
Riding on the rail.”

– John Godfrey Saxe
(as quoted in Railroads On Parade)
Title image: Section of wraparound cover art on the
Railroads On Parade souvenir show book. The artist was
Wm. A. MacKay.

Donald-Brian Johnson is the co-author of numerous
Schiffer books on design and collectibles, including Postwar
“Farewell to A New President,” a pageant photo depicting Pop, a collection of his columns. Please address inquiries to:
Abraham Lincoln’s 1861 departure from New York, en route to Washington, D.C. donaldbrian@msn.com. Photo Associate: Hank Kuhlmann

26 Journal of Antiques and Collectibles