This is an amazing podcast!! I have listened to 4 times and am about to start it again. The “Santa Monica” is both heartfelt and haunting. This pod kept me off the rails.

One of the best podcasts ever. Super engaging

I listen to A LOT of podcasts and this one hooked me and I loved every minute of it. It’s true crime, it’s real life, it’s happy, it’s sad, it’s intriguing. I could go on because it taps so many feelings and experiences. I wish there was going to be a second season, and am truly bummed that it wasn’t renewed. I really hope Danielle is able to find a home for this fascinating topic. Thank you for shining light on something virtually no one knows about.

Hi Danelle, I’ve enjoyed the podcast. I’ve ridden trains and know many who have and the photo you have looks like a friend of mine who has since passed. Do you know who it is and where you found it? Thank you!

I absolutely was hanging on to each and every word. Everything about this podcast has my mind spinning. It’s amazing how much goes on in and around the rail yard, how a simple life is not always simple. How parents deal and how those who live on the rails deal with the day to day of not knowing the next one. I have my fingers crossed that some way we will have more to listen to in the future.

This was a fascinating podcast. Very sad to hear we won’t be getting a second season.

Please make this a tv series or documentary. I want more of it! I couldn’t stop listening. Amazing. I’m only on episode 6. Am sad that it will end in a few episodes.

A seriously addicting podcast. I was hooked from the first episode. I learned so much and was emotionally tied to the story line. A must listen!

Once I started listening, I couldn’t put the podcast down. It is brilliant from start to finish— original, compassionate, full of fascinating characters. Thank you Denelle Morton from a fellow Oaklandish woman. ;)

Started off interesting but quickly became boring. I was interested in the narrators daughter and where she would travel and hear those stories but, the episode quickly turn to other topics of railroad history, rider culture, hobo legends, and other topics that I didn’t give a flip about. By the time I was in episode 7 I couldn’t wait for the show to end. I started skipping ahead in small increments to hear if something familiar would be discussed again. I do not recommend this podcast unless you have some hobo interests.

I also wanna hear about the vandals! talk about graffiti and do a book to go with.

I drive a semi, so I have a lot of time to listen to all kinds of podcasts. This is hands down my favorite podcast of all time. I need season 2! I don’t think I can live without it!!

If the podcast is deemed investigative journalism, I would expect all the details to be factual. This is not the case with the host’s personal story; her daughter did not simply vanish on her graduation day. Google “Marissa Spoer” (her daughter’s real name) and you’ll find that parts of her story were fabricated and the timeline is altered by many years. Bummer because the host is clearly talented and could have told the truth and made it equally as compelling.

This was a great podcast,honestly cannot wait for the next one,the story of the railroad conductor is so brutal honest how the railroad is and how they treat there employees my husband works for BNSF and is a3rd generation railroader and often says he would never recommend working on The railroad to our children or anyone for that matter. Continue the amazing work and thank you. Yvonne

We need more of you please

ITs just the best. I need to relisten this story and absorbe its everything.

I love this podcast. What a great story. I hope it ends with a happy ending.

An eye opening and fascinating story. Makes you see the unseen parts of our country differently. Enjoyed every episode.

i enjoyed every minute. as a mom of a 20 year old girl it was easy to jump into this amazing storytellers shoes. i love learning about culture and now i know about one i didn't even know existed. thank you!

Wonderful podcast. It’s as informative as it is moving. Congrats to the creators.

Of course they’re not going to want to share anything with you, much less move back home with you!!! To be fair, I might be getting on my soap box too early (I’m only on ep 6) but the parents, Carey and Danelle, make no effort to check in with, validate, or truly respect their kids. No asking about their emotions, thoughts, opinions, or experiences but plenty of judgment and condescension. For crying out loud, ask for their war stories, their favorite memories, the weirdest thing they ate, whatever!! Tell them you respect them or are proud of them for having willingly survived the things they’ve been through. I’m not saying you have to agree with everything they’re doing, but Jesus give some credit where credit is due and treat them like respectable human beings. Put yourself in their shoes. If you were being treated, thought of, and talked to the way you treat them, would you want to listen much less move back home? Or would you want to go somewhere where you feel loved and accepted where you are? Also, hiding things about your life from them doesn’t make you a good parent. It makes you deceitful and sends the message that you don’t value or think of them as adults but rather that you see them as little kids. You want them to share with you, take the initiative and share with them. How can you expect something you aren’t even willing to do?

I just completed episode 10 having fit the season in about a week. Initially I rated it a 4/5 but now that I am returning to my regularly listened to weekly published podcasts, I find myself nostalgic, missing the stories of the hobos and the freedom of the rail life. Even the characters in the story, but particularly, the haunting music of Ruby with her song about Santa Monica and her windowsill. I find myself humming it and my girls whom had overheard the episodes in passing are humming and whistling it. This is a great eye-opening story. It makes me want to know more. It even makes me imagine that when life is hard, depression is a gaping hole, there are so many adventures out there that we were never even privy to. Thank you, Danelle, for sharing this adventure! I look forward to season 2.

Amazing story and reporting!

Thanks for this show. You are sharing experiences about a life i wanted to live when I was younger but had no idea about the dark side. PLEASE make more podcasts. Your an amazing storyteller.

Really great listening. Thorough, grungy, compassionate, and informative. I was impressed with how many different voices & perspectives were amplified throughout the season. So many personalities on the rails! And a fairly objective history lesson of the American railroad too! Another reviewer mentioned that too much time was focused on rail cops, but I really appreciated the peek into policing of the railroad because I’ve always wondered about it. Though there was storytelling about family & financial struggles that I leaned into, this podcast was an exploration into the alternative lifestyle of “hobos” (I learned that’s a title to be proud of!) and the everyday Americans that work on the rails. A strange but interesting balance of respect and acceptance.

Interesting premise, and what appears to be an engrossing tale...but questions of presentation and authenticity aside, the frequency of commercial interruptions makes it unlistenable as far as I’m willing to tread. It’s too bad, at the very least it could’ve been a nice piece of fiction, maybe even a great piece of gonzo reportáge

This story is beautifully written. It gave the story of so many a voice. I’ve been fascinated by the rails since I was a teen in the 90s I was never brave enough to join the wanderers but I dreamt of it. This gave me a glimpse of what could have been. Just stunning!

If you don’t correct your child. Life will.

Danelle Morton fabricated her daughter’s story for the purposes of manipulating the audience into having a personal connection to this podcast. There is plenty of interesting subject matter here. However to base the entire series on the fiction of this mother/daughter relationship makes you question what else is false.

If you’re interested in listening to a journalist play a concerned mother and editorialize why her daughter might have possibly run off to be a train hopper, all while trying to immerse herself into what you can tell she thinks is a hip, counter culture, then you’ll love this pod. To everyone else, just do what this parent didn’t and realize peer groups have the biggest influence on adolescents and while being open to people is virtuous, maybe don’t glorify your child’s dissent into a counter culture as a hip, coming of age story you can write about and capitalize on…one which gives you an excuse to say pig with wings over and over.

Listens like a thriller for anyone that’s been a teen punk that tried to do anything cool without their parents and felt like their parents were looking over their shoulder the whole time

I really enjoyed this podcast, and am psyched about the next season. I do wish you went a bit more into the different cultures of the riders, I could do with less about the cops and more about the people.

Fascinating! Keep ‘‘em coming!!! Also when is season 2 coming out???

Interesting peek into a different world. Well investigated and reported. Great story! However it seems to be running out of momentum. I’m not interested in the second season.

37 minutes into several hours of content about a missing daughter and we’re listening to a screed on how railroads were run by corrupt executives and that we stole Indian land. Can we get a reprieve?

I started listening to this in the 2nd or 3rd week I think. I was quickly hooked and every week waiting for the next episode. I recommended it to everyone. I’m ready for bonus content please!

I really enjoyed this podcast. I never heard much about Hobos, although I remember growing up we lived in between two railroad tracks and me and my brother and a friend would walk inside one of the box cars when they would stop and on occasion there would be a hobo roaming around and we would go home and bring back some type of canned food. The few that I came across were nice and interesting. I just didn’t think they were still around, What an adventure this would be however, not for me but I can see how some would be intrigued to explore this lifestyle for a time. Thank you for bringing this to life and sharing your experience.

An absolute masterpiece, among the best things I’ve heard in audio in 25 years. Weaves together a jarring and revelatory portrait of the railroad—one of the darkest sides of America apparently—with a personal portrait of motherhood. The story is every broadening and deepening until you question everything about American society. I never thought anything would top S-Town but this does.

Such a great listen. It really makes you think about how to exist and why others choose different paths.

Beautifully produced, compelling and fascinating! It’s rendered our homeless more visible and more human, which is such a gift. Thank you!

mother and daughter call cab from west side of north platte’s Bailey yard to avoid the hump

I am listening to a train going by my house right now, thinking about when it will get to Colton (maybe 10 or 20 minutes is my guess), wondering about the people that might be on board, and how they have fared on their journey. This podcast is kind of magical in the sense that it has made me look differently at my surroundings, and listen differently to the sounds that I have been hearing for many years, fall in love with new kinds of songs, and perceive life and poetry in landscapes that once looked barren to me. I am looking forward to the next season!

Memorable modern-day & somehow uniquely American characters plus insight into history & how railroads shaped the United States, paired with a mother’s anguish & self-searching makes for compelling storytelling.

Danelle Morton is a terrific storyteller. I love her spirit and her journalistic sensibility. The combination of the mother-daughter story and the expose of the industry is inspired. BUT….. Danelle as narrator has a very distinct verbal tic that makes listening difficult. She rushes her words, particularly the first few syllables/words of a new sentence. I frequently have to stop and think hard: what did she just say? And generally she speaks too quickly and with too little affect — she’s flat - when compared to the best podcasters. I really hope she does another series. But first I hope she works with a vocal coach to help her make her delivery much more powerful.

…of storytelling heaven! Thank you DM!

Heartfelt, real humanistic story of rail riders and culture - what pulls them in - impact and longing of their families who want to understand their kids and the culture. And how the govt has failed us here.

Great reporting and storytelling. Loses 2 stars for lefty moralizing (“the system is rigged!”) and commercials (“the system is rigged!”)

4 stars for an entertaining podcast and looking forward to season 2 which promises to be good. I just had to take 1 star off. This shouldn't stop anyone from listening but I would have prefered a more direct explanation of the changes between the real daughter's story and what is in the cast. Facts seem to blur with fiction - Daughter it appears went to college and didn't flee on graduation day as stated. Fiction podcasts are OK, but just be up front. That said, hey it's a good listen.

Overall, I'm enjoying this show quite a bit, and I'm learning a lot about a culture I didn't know existed anymore—or hadn't even thought about existing anymore. Right now, I'm in the middle of E6 ("Comfort Offensive"), and I'm afraid to keep listening to the episode. The narrator's daughter is coming home for Christmas—her first visit since she ran away to hobo—and all the narrator-mom can think is how to "make" her daughter stay home. How? Well, she's making the home EXACTLY the way it was when her daughter ran away, but more so. Um... Anyway, I'll probably listen to the rest of the episode sometime. But I sure wish I could have a long talk with the mom beforehand about codependency and staying on her side of the street.

I know 2 people that road the rails in their younger days. This podcast is shedding some light on what they may have experienced that they didn’t share. Thank you!