Back before my ISP decided I didn't really need a website and summarily deleted it without notification, I used to get many inquiries from people who had ancestors who worked for the railroad I had a short history page about. At the time, there was a specific web page on the Railroad Retirement Board's website to help address how RRB might be able to provide info for genealogical research (for a fee of course). Looking very quickly, I can no longer find such a specific page on RRB's website, but perhaps a deeper search would reveal one.
Note that this would only help if your ancestor worked for the railroad on and after 1934, when RRB was created.