Link, O. Winston. The Last Steam Railroad in America: Photographs by O. Winston Link.

Abrams, 1995. Reprint, hardcover with near very good protected dust jacket that has some edge and corner wear. 144 pages with outstanding black-and-white and color photographs by O. Winston Link of the Norfolk and Western Railway in Virginia in the mid-1950s and text by Thomas H. Garner.  Link spent five years on this project and this book includes his remarkable photographs taken of trains both by day and at night with synchronized flash.  Garver’s text provides historical information on the Norfolk and Western as well as how Link set up his camera and lighting for each of the photos. Summary:

The Last Steam Railroad in America: Photographs by O. Winston Link is a photography book that documents the final years of steam-powered trains in the United States. The book features dramatic black-and-white and color photographs taken between 1955 and 1960 along the Norfolk and Western Railway, the last major American railroad to rely on steam locomotives before switching to diesel engines.

Link carefully planned and staged many of his photographs, often shooting at night and using dozens of flashbulbs to light entire scenes. This technique allowed him to capture trains in motion with striking detail and dramatic lighting. Over five years, he produced about 2,400 photographs that recorded the powerful locomotives, railroad workers, and the small towns and everyday life surrounding the tracks.

The book is more than a collection of train photographs. It shows how steam railroads were connected to American culture and community life in the 1950s—featuring scenes such as drive-in movie theaters, rural homes, swimming holes, and towns where trains passed by regularly. Through these images, Link preserved the atmosphere of a disappearing era as steam locomotives were replaced by modern diesel engines.

In summary:
The Last Steam Railroad in America is a visual record of the end of the steam-train era in the United States. Through carefully crafted photographs, Link captures both the technology of the trains and the everyday life of the communities around them, preserving a moment in American history just before steam railroads disappeared.

Ogle Winston Link (1914–2001) was an American commercial photographer renowned for his striking, meticulously staged black-and-white nocturnal photographs documenting the final era of steam railroading in the United States. Trained as a civil engineer at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, Link developed a technical mastery that allowed him to invent elaborate synchronized flashbulb systems, enabling him to illuminate vast night landscapes, massive steam engines, and small-town life simultaneously. Between 1955 and 1960, working largely self-funded, he created a celebrated body of work capturing the Norfolk and Western Railway—the last major line operating steam locomotives—blending technical brilliance with cinematic nostalgia as he framed roaring trains alongside drive-in theaters, swimming holes, and quiet rural stations. Though widely respected in commercial advertising during his mid-century career, Link gained major fine-art museum recognition in the 1980s and 1990s, securing his status as both a master photographer and an irreplaceable chronicler of American industrial history.