We boarded the train at dawn. The stainless-steel cars glowed beneath the streetlamps of downtown Mobile, Alabama, ready for the engine’s pull. Inside our coach car, we hoisted our bags into the overhead storage and settled into two navy-blue leather seats. I peered out our window, where a line of passengers still waited to show the conductor their tickets. A young couple in shorts and sandals. A group of women wearing matching pink family-reunion T-shirts. A father and his elementary-age son, who wore glasses and a flat-billed hat and held his dad’s hand.