Gestern • 37 Min.

Some ghosts haunt houses, some haunt people, but are there ghosts that haunt the places where America was built? Outside Fayetteville, North Carolina, the Vander Light is said to be the lantern of Archer Matthews, a railroad worker who was decapitated by a passing train and continues walking the tracks in search of his missing head. But what if the railroad is more than a place for a ghost to linger? What if it's a passageway between the America that was, the America that is, and the America still to come? Our guest, Sal Ciano, co-author of "In the Shadow of the Eldritch and Other Lovecraftian Tales," joins us to talk about a ghostly train story of his own as we follow the Vander Light into strange territory where folklore, history, and the American landscape collide. Along the way, we consider the railroad as a delivery system for the past, carrying its ghosts into the present, and find an unexpected connection to our movie of the week, "Unstoppable," starring Denzel Washington and Chris Pine. Perhaps these two railroad men are Archer Matthews returned, given another chance to face the machine that killed him. This time, though, the ghost might just save us all. The trains keep moving. The tracks remember. And sometimes, something comes back the other way. Keep your Gauge Illuminations on the right track.