John B. Fravert railroad collection

John B. Fravert (1926-1998), known to all as "Jack" was in an enviable position to combine a life-long hobby with his profession. Jack was obsessed by railroading since his growing-up years in suburban St. Matthews just east of Louisville. The Fravert home sat just two blocks from the L&N Railroad main line to Cincinnati, where Jack took his earliest train photographs. W.A. Fravert, Jack's dad, was an L&N telegraph operator, and the elder Fravert's work at area depots and junction towers gave Jack more time for pictures. Just after World War II, Jack enlisted in the U.S. Army and trained at Fort Monmouth, N. J., as a Signal Corps photographer, that service helping him hone his skills with cameras. On his return to Louisville, Jack became the outside salesman for a major photo supply company; his territory covered Kentucky and Southern Indiana, and business trips allowed him to visit and take photos at rail stations and facilities about the two states. Again, through his father's L&N employment, Jack gained access to Louisville area rail shops and yards normally off limits to all but employees. Over his lifetime, Jack shot perhaps 40,000 color transparencies of area railroading as well as countless black and white negatives. Many of the images were of railroaders at work as well as the engines, trains and stations they manned. All in all, it was an unequaled record of the regional and local rail transportation scene, much of it taken during the transition years when passenger trains were heavily patronized, when diesels replaced older steam power, and when new technologies - later to revolutionize the entire rail industry - were still on the horizon or were just being introduced. Jack was always very generous with his photographic output, sharing rail images with railroaders and rail fans alike, and many of his pictures appeared in local and national rail publications. A selection of his color work of trains in and around Louisville was recently published by Morning Sun Books in two volumes"Trackside Around Louisville, East and West." (Bio notes by Charles B. Castner.).