Planes, trains and automobiles: The remarkable life of Bill Noble

Wakaw, Sask. — Bill Noble has spent a lifetime on the move.

He’s worked on fighter jets, helped develop weapons systems for military aircraft, raced single-seat cars through the desert and flown small planes across the sky.

But these days, the journey he enjoys most moves at about 40 kilometres per hour.

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As conductor of the Wheatland Express, Noble spends his days pulling passengers into a world where the destination is only part of the experience.

The Wheatland Express first hit the rails in 2018, offering themed excursion rides between Wakaw and Cudworth. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)

It seems a fitting place to end up. His life has always been about movement. And in many ways, the entire journey started with a train.

Noble grew up in Girvin, a small Saskatchewan community that has only a handful of residents today. But when he was a boy, it was a busy stop along the Canadian National Railway line between Winnipeg and Edmonton.

As a child, Noble would wake up at night to the sound of a rumbling train approaching town.

“The trains would blow, and they were steam locomotives at the time, so they had that beautiful chime whistle,” he recalled whistfully.

The sound would wake him briefly before he drifted back to sleep. He never forgot it.

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His father worked for the grain company, and the elevator sat across the tracks from the CN station. When they had mail to send, he would walk across the tracks to the station and wait for the train. Sometimes, young Bill went with him.

“We would stand on the platform and wait for the train to come in,” Noble said.

When the train arrived, his father would hand letters to the mail car.

“I always remembered that because this big thing came, basically just for him, it seemed.”

For a young boy growing up on the prairies, the railway was a connection to somewhere much bigger. From Girvin, he said, the train could take you almost anywhere.

“You could buy or arrange for tickets that would take you to Budapest or Moscow,” he marvelled.

“This is the gateway to the world.”

But Noble’s curiosity did not stay on the rails.

He wanted to fly.

Bill Noble spent many years as an armament officer with the Canadian Air Force, working with the systems that carried weapons on military aircraft. (Bill Noble/Submitted)

He was accepted into the Air Force and became an armament officer, working with the systems that carried weapons on military aircraft.

His work took him into experimental work in Cold Lake, where he helped test new weapons and aircraft systems. Later, he worked with the U.S. Air Force in Florida, designing and testing safety systems for military weapons.

It was a career built around some of the most advanced technology of the time.

Bill Noble brought his expertise to the U.S. Air Force in Florida, designing and testing safety systems for military weapons. (Bill Noble/Submitted)

Then there were the cars.

After stumbling across an article in Road & Track magazine about a racing school in California, Noble decided he wanted to try it.

“I read that, and I thought, ‘Damn, I can do that,'” he laughed.

So he did.

He took the course, bought a used single-seat race car and spent nearly four seasons competing.

“I was never any good,” he said. “But that’s okay. I had fun.”

Bill Noble began racing almost on a whim. He saw an article in a magazine and quickly decided to give it a try. (Bill Noble/Submitted)

That may be the thread connecting every chapter of Noble’s life.

The machines were interesting — but the fun experiences were what mattered.

And that is what still draws him to trains.

Compared with airplanes, trains are slower. Compared with cars, they are less direct. But that’s exactly the point.

The Wheatland Express, he explained, is not simply transportation.

“It’s really an experience, not a way of getting someplace.”

For Noble, trains still carry the same sense of adventure they did when he was a child standing beside the tracks in Girvin.

Before cars and airplanes made travel routine, trains opened the world.

“All of a sudden you were able to go much further, and you knew that it was safe, and you knew that it was comfortable.”

Bill Noble is the conductor of the Wheatland Express. He enthusiastically greets passengers, clips tickets and shares fun facts about trains throughout the journey. (Wheatland Express/Facebook)

He volunteers with the railway museum in Saskatoon and he has watched generations of people respond to trains with the same curiosity.

“There is this aura about them,” he said.

And he still sees it every time a child climbs aboard the Wheatland Express.

“Every once in a while I’m lucky,” Noble said. “Someone will ask me a question or will wonder about something. I love that.”

After a lifetime surrounded by machines designed to move faster, higher and farther, Noble has found joy in something much more simple.

A whistle. A track. A slow ride through the prairies.

The only difference now is that he is no longer the child watching from the platform.

He’s the one welcoming people aboard.

He’s worked with fighter jets, driven race cars and flown planes. Yet the thing that brings Bill Noble the most joy is sharing his childhood passion for trains as conductor of the Wheatland Express. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)