Bricks, Masonry, Asphalt and Concrete - Retaining Wall

Hi I just bot a house. The back yard has a pretty good slop about half way up the back yard. The preveus home owner tried to put up a retaining wall useing railroad ties. The problem is they did not dig a footing. I want to use there railroad ties but I don't want to take the wall down to dig a footer. Is there a way I can dig the bottom of the ties out and replace the dirt with some kind of stone are wall brick? Most of the dirt that is spose to be behind the wall is in the middles of my back yard. I don't want to fill the back of the railroad ties intel i can get the bottom of the wall suported. any help would be nice....Thank You

Scott

It may be possible to excavate beneath the wall in stages and install a footer. I suspect that it won't work as well as otherwise, because it will be put under the wall instead of the wall being set on top of it. How will you pin the first course of ties to the footer?

Thanks for the fast reply. I will take some pics this week sometime and post them so you can see what I am talking about. Like I was saying the guy laid railroad ties across the hill without puting a footer. But what he did do was where the railroad ties ended and the next one started he dug a hole and put a raildroad tie straight up and down in front of the railroad ties he laid across the hill this is how he keeps the wall from falling foward.

How much and how hard would it be to put in a cinder block retaning wall. I have to say I am the only one I have out here to do this work thats why I ask how hard for just one person to do this type of work...................

Thanks
Scott