Railroad monikers or streaks are signatures or drawings done with oil-bars or solid paint markers on the side of freight cars. Traditionally they were done by rail riders and train workers, but they started to take-off in the 90s with graffiti writers, also. When my friend and I first started to really pay attention to trains we noticed lots of signatures on the sides of cars, mostly on the ends were the ladders were, and they looked like they were done in some kind of wax marker, or oil pastel. Some of it looked like “graffiti” as we knew it, but some of it didn’t. The first streaks I remember seeing were; The Solo Artist, The Phonograff, The Rambler, and of course Colossus of Roads. We would see multiple streaks by The Solo Artist on the same line all with different year dates. It made me think these guys must be writing on trains all the time. I still love seeing fresh monikers and also the really old faded ones. Here are some streaks I’ve photographed, plus some from Richmond writers.

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