Saturday a package was delivered to my door containing my author’s copies of my latest book: Steam by the Numbers, published by Kalmbach Media.

I dedicated this work to my wife, Kris. She has a dramatic photograph of restored Soo Line 2-8-2 Mikado 1003 on pages 62 and 63.

This is a nuts and bolts book containing a lot of detail, lots of information, and solid context to tell the story of the many locomotive types covered within. I’ve broken down the history of the North American steam locomotive by the different wheel arrangements and arranged these into 36 individual chapters.

To make this an interesting book to look at I included dozens of photos. Many of these came from my own collection, some exposed by myself, but also images from my father, Richard Jay Solomon, and many contributors. A great many images are from the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania archive, where thanks to the help and patience of Musuem’s Archives Manager Lauren Radkiewicz and PHMC’s Railroad Collections Archivist, Senior Processing Archivist Kurt Bell, I had spend countless hours pouring through vintage photographs.

Among the other significant collections included are those from my late-friends Robert A. Buck and John E. Pickett, as well as those from the Kalmbach archives. George C. Corey supplied some excellent photos of Delaware & Hudson 4-6-6-4s.

J. William Vigrass supplied the dramatic cover image, which captures the majesty of steam .

The book is available through the Kalmbach Hobby Store and other book distributors.

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