Danelle Morton

Danelle Morton is the host of City of the Rails.

How do you describe City of the Rails to people?
On the day of her high school graduation, my daughter skipped town and disappeared into the rails. As a reporter by trade, I followed every lead. I befriended hobos, rail cops and workers to learn more about where Ruby was and how I could entice her home. This is her story, my story and stories from the remarkable characters found in the City of the Rails.

Now describe it in 10 words or less. 
Helluva story about a mom searching for her train-hopping daughter 

When did you realize this was a story, and when did you start telling it?
The story took root when I realized that Ruby had not run away from home. She wasn’t mad at me. Instead, she was running towards something – a place that has its own sense of values and justice. And then I realized, there was a lot more about Ruby I needed to know and the answers were somewhere in this 100 feet wide and 140,000 miles long City of the Rails.

So, I explored the characters, the sounds, the history, the smells, and realized it was too big for a book. Podcasting intrigued me. The incredible intimacy of speaking directly into a person’s ear was a responsibility I could not take lightly. I needed to share the story, the characters I met, the sounds I heard and the lessons I learned.

Fill in the blank: You will like City of the Rails if you like _____.
Hell On Wheels (television series)  Woody Guthrie,  O! Brother Where Art Thou? 

What does Ruby say about the podcast?
She asked that I only tell the truth, even when it was hard to be that open and vulnerable. As I say in Episode 1, Ruby was always cool like that

How much did you map out the story in advance?
Once I committed to making it a podcast, I knew where it would start and I knew where it would finish, but the structure across 10 episodes revealed itself along the way.

Did you have a hard time getting people on the mic?
I had a very hard time getting hobos and railroad people to talk to me.  This is a closed world and mostly people like it that way.  Persistence pays off, plus word of mouth. If I got someone to talk to me, at the end of the interview I’d always ask: Who else should I talk to?  That really helped.

What do these hobos have in common?
Hobos are free spirits. They don’t want to be tied down by possessions and obligations. They choose to live a life with very little money so that they can be free.  In the small world of travelers, reputation is everything and they hold each other to a code of honor. Also, they are some of the most generous people I’ve ever met.  Many of them have had a rough time in the conventional world, so they are incredibly loyal to each other. It’s what helps them survive.

Also…hobos. Not a slur? 
Not at all! It’s an honor. In the first episode one hobo explains how you have to earn the right to call yourself a tramp or a hobo. He didn’t feel comfortable owning that label until he’d been traveling for ten years. 

Were you in any scary or uncomfortable situations when you were reporting?
I made a fool of myself trying to hop a train, which you can hear in episode four.  I walked down some dangerous streets and into a lot of abandoned houses to interview people in episode 9. A lot of the people I’ve interviewed might look scary to people who’ve never explored this world, but it didn’t take many interviews for me to recognize that someone with a rough exterior usually wasn’t frightening at all. 

How did this project change you as a mom?
In the course of working on this, I had to open up idea of motherhood.  I had a plan for Ruby when she was graduating from high school, a very conventional one about her going off to college and making her way from there.  When she disappeared into the train yard, I realized her idea of her future was a lot different. Instead of seeing how she didn’t do what I wanted her to do, I had to recognize she was an adult making her own choices. In some sense, I had to get to know her again. In doing so, I needed to understand why she was making those choices.  This was a lot of work, considering how much danger she was embracing. 

What did you learn about Ruby making City of the Rails?
Ruby and I come from a long line of badass women. Ruby, though, was the baddest of us all with this train hopping thing. I respect her and I am still amazed at her bravery. As everyone will tell you, Ruby is always the coolest person in the room.

What did you learn about reporting making City of the Rails?
In the train yard my fancy journalism credentials didn’t do me any good. People were less likely to talk to me if they heard I’d worked for The New York Times.  Word of mouth was everything, so I had to be honest, decent, and candid, no hidden agendas, in order to get people to open up to me. Not being able to rely on the reputation of my employer, and needing to rely on my own, was refreshing. 

Did any other podcasts serve as inspiration for City of the Rails?
I enjoyed the candor about family life that was so much a part of Stay Away From Matthew MaGill.

What was the most surprising thing you learned making the show?
Sound has incredible power to communicate without words, to set a mood, and to bring people into a world that they can fill with their imaginations.  I’d never been able to use that as a storytelling tool before, and I love it. 

How much research did you do before you set out on the rails?
When I went after my daughter, essentially none. But by the time I started working on the podcast I’d read dozens of books, talked to hundreds of peoples in the ten years getting to know trains. 

What’s something people don’t understand about making a podcast like City of the Rails?
How collaborative it is! Listeners hear the host and may think that person did it all. But the team behind the host works just as hard and is incredibly talented.  Hats off to my amazing team and all the great support they gave me.

Pretend you were going to make another podcast. Don’t worry about the logistics or whether or not anyone would like it. Your budget is $1M. What would it be?
A million!  I’d do a modern 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and explore another world most people don’t know much about – the ocean.  I don’t know if that million would get me my own personal submarine, but that’s what I’m going for.  Let’s start the gofundme! 

Are you a podcast listener?
I am now. I had only heard two of them before I started this. 

What’s a podcast you love that everybody knows about?
Patrick Raddon Keith’s Wind of Change. What a yarn! And Keith is a masterful storyteller

What’s a podcast you love that not enough people know about?
Suave by Maria Hinojosa. It won the Pulitzer last year, but I still don’t think as many people know about as should. Hinojosa befriends a man in prison who was jailed for murder when he was 17 and is there every step of the way when he comes out decades later and tries to adjust to the world.  Heartfelt and surprising at every turn. 

Are there too many podcasts?
I don’t think so!  Are there too few good ones?  Yes.

Is there anything I didn’t ask you about that you want to say?
Going from a book author to a podcaster challenged me. The lesson I will carry forward is that in our DNA we are wired to be storytellers. If you have a good story, people will listen. It’s in our genes.

Thanks, Danelle!