Switch & Baby Girl met at a soup kitchen in Roseville, California. Switch was living in a camp in Black Butte, CA, and he hopped trains to Roseville to see Baby Girl. After an extended courting period, she moved up to the camp where they lived together for a summer. When she became pregnant, they settled off the rails to become parents. On September 19, 1997 Isaiah Russell Wayland Trippett was born. While they are slowly adjusting to life in society, they both agree that they will always be tramps at heart. Switch ran away from home when he was fifteen. He had not spoken with his family for many years until he contacted them about his impending fatherhood. He and Baby Girl bought a van and drove from Bellingham, WA, to Enfield, CT, to celebrate Isaiah's 1st Birthday with Switch's family.
Switch, Baby Girl, and Isaiah currently reside in Nashua, NH. While they are slowly adjusting to life in society, they both agree that they will always be tramps at heart.
Jessica
Her 'transient ways' were adopted early. Jessica's father was a hippie ship captain, and she was born on a restored WWII tanker off the coast of Florida. Her father died in Guatemala when she was a year old. Her mother traveled around the United States in a renovated postal truck with Jessica and her half-sister Tanya before settling in San Francisco. As a child, Jessica also remembers spending the night in a whorehouse in Madagascar while traveling around the world with her mother.
Jessica is currently a special-education teacher in San Mateo, CA.
Lee
A dedicated environmental activist, Lee was involved in many high-profile banner-hangings, and he spent five winters in the Mojave Desert protecting Big Horn Sheep by sabotaging the efforts of trophy hunters. In March 19909, Lee made the NBC Nightly News while protesting Bison hunting outside Yellowstone National Park. While he is mostly retired from his activist days, he still hops freights to attend EarthFirst! gatherings every year.
Lee spends his time traveling, adventuring in mountains and wilderness areas, and enjoying the camaraderie of friends in his forest-dwelling community.
Other Folks
Duffy Littlejohn is an attorney in San Luis Obispo, California. After graduating from high school, Duffy spent five years on the rails before attending the University of California at Santa Barbara. He later wrote a rail riding guide called "Hopping Freight Trains in America."
Luther the Jet started hopping coal trains as a kid in Pennsylvania, and he remembers when the Pennsylvania Railroad stopped running steam engines in February 1954. A folksinger as well as a hobo historian, he was elected King of the Hobos at the National Hobo Convention in Britt, Iowa, in 1995.
North Bank Fred lives near Dunsmuir, CA. He describes the rail yard in Black Butte, CA, as his office where he goes every morning rain or shine. A retired construction worker, North Bank Fred maintains a web site with photos, articles and stories about trainhopping.