The Hobo Handbook
For my Dad’s generation, the Greatest, raised during the Great Depression, the rails that passed through town were an open sesame to the outside world. He told many stories about hopping trains and riding them to destinations unknown, but more exciting than wherever he was. It seemed a cheap, safe, genteel period of time though that may have been more illusion than reality…
The name of the book is a ruse. Camping on Low or No Dollars, the dingy cover page reads. An older edition bears a similarly anodyne title: From Birmingham to Wendover. Both are a misdirection, intended to keep the wrong people—cops, journalists, nosy normies like me—from realizing what they’re holding. The Crew Change Guide is a set of best practices and guidelines for hopping freight trains anywhere in the U.S. and Canada. A “crew change” refers to a train’s personnel shift, a brief window of opportunity for those brave enough to take it. In the heist movie, this is that ten-second gap after the night watchman clocks out and before his replacement takes over. For a train hopper, it’s a rare chance to clamber up a wagon undetected.