English: Eight men laying rail on an embankment during construction of the Wire Creek to Alice Springs section of Central Australia Railway, mid-1920s. The line reached Alice Springs in 1929.

Joe Davis caught the very moment at which the 40-feet (12 metres) length of rail, which they have carried from the trolley in the background, hit the newly laid narrow-gauge sleepers.

At 41 pounds per yard, a rail weighed 547 pounds or 248 kg – an awkward burden of about 70 pounds or 30 kg per man. Safety boots were unknown, and a square of leather held by a strap was a substitute for gloves.

The men are on an embankment that spans a dip in the surrounding country, constructed with horse and human muscle power. Much of the track of the Central Australia Railway and North Australia Railway was simply laid on the ground – sometimes compacted earth, such as on embankments – and track ballast was not laid subsequently. The legacy of such extreme cost-cutting was washaways, collapsed track and derailments, alleviated only by very high levels of maintenance.