I made this night photo of the old Palmer Union Station in Palmer, Massachusetts in March 1985. This was twenty years before the classic H.H. Richardson designed structure was reincarnated and rebuilt as the Steaming Tender restaurant.

Back in those days the old station building served as Bruno’s Billiards. The canopies on the Boston & Albany side of the station still remained as a vestige of the days when passenger trains paused here.

With my Leica 3A mounted on my father’s Linhof tripod, I made one long time exposure on Ilford FP4. This was a prelude to the many night photos I’ve made in Palmer over the subsequent four decades.

The other day, I scanned the negative using an Epson V600 flatbed scanner and made cosmetic adjustments using Adobe Lightroom.

Tracking the Light explores railroad night photography!