The late Otto Perry, a Denver mail carrier, never married, so often spent his Christmas Day photographing trains with his big Graflex camera, which took a postcard-size negative, well suited to shooting long objects like locomotives. Here, on December 25, 1947, his lens caught D&RGW train No. 1, The Royal Gorge, leaving Denver:

http://photoswest.org/cgi-bin/imager?00010569+OP-10569

In those days, railroads ran 365 days a year, and many of the crafts received no extra pay for working the holidays. Today, we have 11 paid holidays, but the only one guaranteed off is December 25, bringing it down to 364. Those who work in passenger service, such as Amtrak, often have to work Christmas also. In 1947, those in other fields of work, like retail, were guaranteed Sundays and holidays off, but today their lives are much like the railroad, as many stores are open every day but Christmas, some 24/7. And the remaining railroads, which seldom haul domestically-produced goods anymore, are doing well bringing cheap Chinese products to Wal-Mart.