During a visit to the Parchman Farm state penitentiary in Mississippi in 1933, Smithsonian Institution musicologist John A. Lomax and his son Alan made a field recording of the song by black inmate Walter McDonald.
[2] Then in the late 1930s, after becoming the first black artist to sign with a major label, gospel singer and guitarist Sister Rosetta Tharpe recorded "This Train" as a hit for Decca.
Over the years, "This Train" has been covered by artists specializing in numerous genres, including blues, folk, bluegrass, gospel, rock, post-punk, jazz, reggae, and zydeco.
Among the solo artists and groups who have recorded it are Louis Armstrong, Big Bill Broonzy, Brothers Four, Hylo Brown, Alice Coltrane, Delmore Brothers, Sandy Denny, D.O.A., Lonnie Donegan, Jimmy Durante, Snooks Eaglin, Bob Gibson, Joe Glazer, John Hammond Jr., Cisco Houston, Janis Ian, Johnny Cash, Mahalia Jackson, Ella Jenkins, Sleepy LaBeef, The Limeliters, Trini Lopez, Bob Marley & The Wailers, Ziggy Marley, The Alarm, Ricky Nelson, Peter, Paul & Mary, Utah Phillips, Pete Seeger, The Seekers, Roberta Sherwood, Hank Snow, David Soul, Staples Singers, Billy Strange, the Tarriers, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Hank Thompson, Bradley Nowell of Sublime, Randy Travis, The Verlaines, Bunny Wailer, Nina Hagen, Girls at Our Best!, Buckwheat Zydeco, The Paul Mirfin Band, Jools Holland, The Au Go Go Singers, Vaneese Thomas for the character, Grace the Bass from the children's TV show "Shining Time Station, and Lifetree Kids.
In mid-1970s in the USSR, Dean Reed made a TV clip version of "This Train" as a "gospel" of a kind in praise to the BAM - a grand Soviet Trans-Siberian railroad that was being built in that period.