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The Railroads (Nineteenth Century America)
The Railroads - Nineteenth Century America Author:Leonard Everett Fisher In 1800, transportation in America was limited to dirt roads and natural waterways. Latex there were canals, but it was the invention of the "iron horse" that enabled the country to expand rapidly and develop industrially. There were few whose lives weren't affected. — Railroads played an important role in the Civil War, and it was ... more »unrelenting pressure to open up the West that resulted in the completion of the first transcontinental rail line—from the Atlantic to the Pacific—in 1869.
By the 1880's there were four additional transcontinental railroads, all of which were built at the expense of the Indians. It was Sioux oppostion to the laying of Northern Pacific tracks that led to "Custer's Last Stand" at the Battle of the Little Big Horn.
The story of railroads in nineteenth century America includes presidents and tycoons, Bat Masterson and Jesse James, and Casey Jones, who "took his farewell trip to that promised land" in 1900.« less