Oral History of Railway Crew and Veterans
Since 2012, we have used oral history research methods to document lesser-known railway history. In addition to exploring information missing from historical records, we have also recorded numerous vivid and flesh-and-blood stories. Our interviewees are typically railway-related personnel such as locomotive drivers, station masters, and residents living along the lines. Part of the precious materials collected has been incorporated into the book My Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway, and another part eventually culminated in the documentary The Locomotive Depot at the Foot of the Great Wall. Their oral histories provided invaluable historical materials for these two works, filling gaps left in official records.
More than a decade has passed, and many of the interviewees from those years have already passed away. Humanity cannot contend with nature, but through our lens, they are forever here telling:
Their remarkable lives, and those railway techniques that have already been lost to time.
From parts of the footage for The Locomotive Depot at the Foot of the Great Wall, we edited The Last Emperor of Steam Locomotives, which recounts the working memories of the last generation of steam locomotive drivers on the Guanguan section of the Nankou Locomotive Depot along the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway. They once piloted massive steam locomotives to conquer treacherous mountain passes with an average gradient of up to 33 per mille; drivers capable of navigating the Guanguan section were revered as "living immortals three feet off the ground."
Ten years ago, Wang Wei invited three generations of veteran Nankou drivers to reunite beside a steam locomotive at the Hongye Steel Plant. Donning their old uniforms and holding their tools once again, they shared the stories of their railway lives.