Before microphones, motorcades, and media blitzes — there were trains.

From the 1890s to the 1950s, campaign trains were a critical part of how American presidential candidates reached the public. Politicians like William Jennings Bryan, FDR, and Harry Truman crisscrossed the country, delivering speeches from the back of specially outfitted railcars — meeting thousands of voters face-to-face in a whirlwind of stops and spectacle.

In this episode, we trace the rise and fall of the campaign train — from Bryan’s grueling 18,000-mile tour in 1896 to Truman’s legendary 1948 whistle-stop comeback. What made these rolling platforms so powerful? And why did they vanish from the political stage?

Explore how this lost tradition once shaped American history — and why it came to a stop.