Podcast appearances · Radar

Ed Dickens

Senior Manager of Union Pacific Heritage Operations; locomotive engineer specializing in Big Boy No. 4014 restoration and steam heritage programs

3

APPEARANCES

3

PODCASTS

Jul 7, 2026

sarah marie anderson's podcast

sarah marie anderson's podcast

A fourth full of fireworks ( Brad Milky)

Jul 7 · 16m

10:59

And found a seat behind Ed Dickens, the engineer who restored this locomotive himself and now drives it around the country.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:05

Well, we're inside the cab.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:07

This is where the crew operates the locomotive.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:09

You got a fireman over on the left here, engineer over on the right.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:13

Ed looks the part.

11:22

More than once, I heard a child chittering, there's Ed Dickens.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:28

Do you like your job? Oh, it's a wonderful job for all of us.

Ed DickensGUEST

11:31

You know, you can probably hear in the background.

A Fourth Full of Fireworks

Jul 6 · 26m

Brad MielkeHOST

23:17

And I asked him flat out, "What is it about this train, this route, this moment that draws people in?"

Ed DickensGUEST

23:23

People are looking for a human connection, and in the modern railroading, the locomotives and the windows are a little bit tinted.

Ed DickensGUEST

23:30

They're smaller.

Ed DickensGUEST

23:32

It's hard to see the human beings.

Ed DickensGUEST

23:34

There's a person in there somewhere, but you don't see them.

Brad MielkeHOST

23:36

Right.

Ed DickensGUEST

23:36

On this locomotive, the windows are large.

Ed DickensGUEST

23:39

Uh, we're prominent up here.

CNN 5 Good Things

CNN 5 Good Things

Inside America's 250th Birthday Time Capsule

Jul 4 · 16m

Krista Bo PolancoHOST

9:21

Ed Dickens is the senior manager for Union Pacific Heritage Operations.

Ed DickensGUEST

9:25

I mean, you can feel the heat radiating off of this thing from 100 feet back.

Ed DickensGUEST

9:29

The whistle, you can hear that whistle coming for miles.

Ed DickensGUEST

9:32

The ground rumbles.

Ed DickensGUEST

9:34

It really is a crowd-pleasing locomotive.

Krista Bo PolancoHOST

10:10

And 85 years later, Ed says it's still carrying something important: a reminder of what helped build this nation.

Ed DickensGUEST

10:17

It represents the importance of the economic vibrance of what a railroad system does.

Ed DickensGUEST

10:24

Brought us together when the first transcontinental railroad was built, and what brings us together still.