Jonathan Cohen's photos with the keyword: train

The Chicago L is now 125 years old. This network of elevated trains and subways is how Chicagoans get around. But it’s also an iconic symbol of the city. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many American cities used elevated trains to transport their residents. In most cities, those elevated systems were eventually replaced by subways. While Chicago has two subway lines, the majority of its trains are either elevated or at grade (at ground level). Today, Chicago is the only city in the U.S. that still has elevated trains in its downtown area.

It has been nearly three decades since the last train departed the shed at Reading Terminal. Designed by Philadelphia’s Wilson Brothers and built by Charles McCall, Reading Terminal’s vast balloon shed is the last surviving example of its type in the United States. It no longer houses trains but has been transformed into a gigantic lobby of the new Pennsylvania Convention Center. This large mural inside between the Pennsylvania Convention Center, Market East and the Gallery conveys a sense of what the shed was like in the late 1930's.

Born in Silver Creek, Pennsylvania, in 1910 Jack Savatsky was well known for his bright and colorful depictions of life in and around the hard-coal regions of Lansford, Pennsylvania. He drew with a variety of materials and painted in oils on all kinds of surfaces (in this case on fiberboard). Many folk artists get their start late in life as a way to keep themselves occupied after retirement. They bring rich memories and personal views of the world to their subjects. In this painting, Savitsky shows a train bringing workers to the mines of Silver Creek, the "coal town" in Pennsylvania where he grew up. He worked in the mines for more than thirty-five years before health issues forced him to retire in 1959. He died in Coaldale, Pennsylvania in1991.

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

Taken on the day that the New York Stock Exchange delisted Lehman Brothers

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, hundreds of thousands of immigrants from northern, southern, and eastern Europe passed through this terminal to board the trains that would take them from Ellis Island to their new homes throughout the United States.