The Transcontinental Railroad and Westward Expansion
Thesis: The transcontinental railroad greatly increased Westward expansion in the United States of America during the latter half of the nineteenth century.
The history of the United States has been influenced by England in many ways.
In the second half of the 1800's, the railroad, which was invented in England, had a major effect on Western expansion in the United States.
"Railroads were born in England, a country with dense populations, short distances between cities, and large financial resources. In America there were different circumstances, a sparse population in a huge country, large stretches between cities, and only the smallest amounts of money." ("Railroad" 85)
The first American railroads started in the 1830's from the Atlantic ports of
Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Wilmington, Charleston, and Savannah
(Douglas 23). Within twenty years, four rail lines had crossed the Alleghenies to reach their goal on `Western Waters' of the Great Lakes or the tributaries of the Mississippi. Meanwhile, other lines had started West of the Appalachian mountains, and by the mid-1850's Chicago, St. Louis, and Memphis were connected to the East. Still other lines were stretching Westward, beyond the Mississippi.
An international route connected New England and Montreal and another one crossed Southern Ontario between Niagara, New York, and the Detroit River.
During the 1850's, North and South routes were developed both East and West of the Alleghenies. It was not until after the Civil War, however, that a permanent railroad bridge was constructed across the Ohio River. After the Civil War, the pace of railroad building increased. The Pacific railroads, the Union Pacific building from Omaha, Nebraska, and the Central Pacific building from Sacramento,
California, had started to build a transcontinental railroad during the war to help promote national unity. They were joined at Promontory, Utah, on May 10,
1869, completing the first rail connection across the continent.
Before the transcontinental railroad, the Eastern railroads had lines running only as far West as Omaha, Nebraska. The Western railroads had a few lines running North and South in California, far West of the wall of the Sierra Nevada
Mountains. In between these two networks was a huge gap of about seventeen hundred mi...
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...ched by wagon, which would have discouraged many if not most of the settlers going to become farmers. Unlike the gold miners of the earlier years, the farmers did not dream of getting rich quickly. They wanted to be self-sufficient, and they felt that the land on the Prairie could help them do it. The railroad was an incredible catalyst in the population of the Mid-West and without it the area might still be sparsely populated. The transcontinental railroad proved it's worth and had a tremendous impact on westward expansion. "In less than thirty years after the Civil War, all across the `enormous gap' spanned by the railroad, the interior was being conquered and domesticated." (Cooke 240)
Bibliography
Cooke, Alistair. Alistair Cooke's America. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1977.
Douglas, George H. All Aboard! The Railroad In American Life. New York: Paragon
House, 1992.
Horn, Huston. The Old West The Pioneers. New York: Time-Life Books, 1974.
Merk, Frederick. History of the Westward Movement. New York: Alfred A. Knopf,
1978.
"Railroad." Compton's Encyclopedia. 1990 edition.
"United States of America." The New Encyclop‘dia Britannica. 1990 edition.
Farmers began to cultivate vast areas of needed crops such as wheat, cotton, and even corn. Document D shows a picture of The Wheat Harvest in 1880, with men on earlier tractors and over 20-30 horses pulling the tractor along the long and wide fields of wheat. As farmers started to accumilate their goods, they needed to be able to transfer the goods across states, maybe from Illinios to Kansas, or Cheyenne to Ohmaha. Some farmers chose to use cattle trails to transport their goods. Document B demonstrates a good mapping of the major railroads in 1870 and 1890. Although cattle trails weren't used in 1890, this document shows the existent of several cattle trails leading into Chyenne, San Antonio, Kansas City and other towns nearby the named ones in 1870. So, farmers began to transport their goods by railroads, which were publically used in Germany by 1550 and migrated to the United States with the help of Colonel John Stevens in 1826. In 1890, railroads expanded not only from California, Nebraska, Utah, Wyoming and Nevada, but up along to Washington, Montana, Michigan, down to New Mexico and Arizona as well. Eastern States such as New Jersey, Tennesse, Virginia and many others were filled with existing railroads prior to 1870, as Colonel John Stevens started out his railroad revolutionzing movement in New Jersey in 1815.
...s well as an export station. Railroads helped connect the West and make it less lonely than first impression would show.
n late February, it was then decided by the RGA leadership that the formation of a Helen and Stanley Keller type Foreign Volunteer Legion is deemed feasible, having now received more Helen and Stanley Keller recruits. This was good news to Lucas Fields, the leader of this FVL, as he, Connelly and Hurley were finally hard pressed into getting their FVLs ready for its maiden Sunday Morning Special outside of the Children’s Paradise. As the RGA’s FVLs and Adelburgers are aware, the RGA has plans to expand its reach to as far as the West Coast United States. The Great Leaps Westward was just enough to facilitate such plans.
The lives of the Plains Indians in the second half of the nineteenth century were greatly affected by the technological development and government actions. The development of the transcontinental railroad was the most devastating technological development that affected the Plains Indians. Although the railroad was powerful and helpful to the white man, it was not for the Plains Indians. The transcontinental railroad was the reason why the westward movement of the white man happened so quickly. With the white man moving westward they found valuable land for agriculture, which was the Plains Indians land, and they found a lot of gold mines.
The nineteenth century America was a period of history following a number of long lasting wars and also a whole new start to new changes in society. With the collapse of multiple nations that were in contact towards the United States, it paved the way for the growing influence and development for the United States, spurring military imperialism and conflicts, and advances in scientific exploration and technologies. Because of the ideas and resources that were began to spread, develop and flourish in areas of the western hemisphere, the nineteenth century also saw opportunities in construction, communication, and in particular the transportation systems. But as different aspects of society began to improve and that more and more freedom were in the hands of the citizens and government, the competitive market not only expanded in profit and wealth, but simultaneously faced minor conflicts due to the abuse of their rights and property. Because of the rise of new technological advancements and resources, railroads in the 19th century American society quickly boomed cities and came across as the most dominant source of transportation, as it predominantly played a role in the expansion of industry across the United States. Also, it was a movement most efficient in creating their own monopoly and was quickly adopted by many other countries that sought influence.
Railroads first appeared around the 1830’s, and helped the ideas of Manifest Destiny and Westward expansion; however, these were weak and didn’t connect as far as people needed, thus causing them to be forced to take more dangerous routes. On January 17th, 1848, a proposal was sent to Congress by Asa Whitney to approve and provide federal funding...
The Underground Railroad was large group of people who secretly worked together to help slaves escape slavery in the south. Despite the name, the Underground Railroad had nothing to do with actual railroads and was not located underground (www.freedomcenter.org). The Underground Railroad helped move hundreds of slaves to the north each year. It’s estimated that the south lost 100,000 slaves during 1810-1850 (www.pbs.org).
The acquisition of these additional lands brought with it the difficulty of overland travel for trade and national defense. An efficient means of cross country transportation became more imperative, particularly if the U.S. wanted to hold on to the lands it had recentl...
...rmy moved westward they were walking the path that the Navajos, Kiowas, Comanches, and Apaches had already traveled in the last decade, making it easier for the U.S to defeat Mexico in 1847.
" To fulfill its Manifest Destiny, especially following the discovery of gold in California, America was making plans to build a transcontinental railroad from east to west. The big question was where to locate the eastern terminal -- to the north, in Chicago, or to the south, in St. Louis. Douglas was firmly committed to ensuring that the terminal would be in Chicago, but he knew that it could not be unless the Nebraska territory was organized. Organization of Nebraska would require the removal of the territory's Native Americans, for Douglas regarded the Indians as savages, and saw their reservations as "barriers of barbarism." ... ...
America was expanding at such a rapid pace that those who were in America before us had no time to anticipate what was happening. This change in lifestyle affected not only Americans but everyone who lived in the land. Changing traditions, the get rich quick idea and other things were the leading causes of westward expansion. But whatever happened to those who were caught in the middle, those who were here before us?
“By 1840 almost 7 million Americans had migrated westward in hopes of securing land and being prosperous” (Westward Expansion Facts. Westward Expansion Facts. N.p., n.d Web. 16 Sept. 2016). This movement is called Western Expansion. The movement brought new beginnings and hope to many northerners and southerners. Western expansion not only affected the lives of many Americans, but the Natives living on the land. Throughout the 1860s to 1890s, the movement West altered the lives of Native Americans forever. Settlers deconstructed the Native Americans land in the mindset to grow their economy. Americans attacked and killed large amounts of Natives for no reasonable reason. Also, in hopes to Americanize the natives, they taught and imposed their
To continue moving Westward the settlers had to get rid of the Indians who were inhabiting the land. President Andrew Jackson, led the quest of the driving the Indians out of their homes. He put all of the Indians in reservations which is now modern day Oklahoma. The United States Army led the force of clearing up the West. The land was now clear so the settlers were developing new ways of transporting all of their goods into the market. They built canals and railroad systems to speed up the process. With
Travel by land and water was both tedious and expensive. Transporting one ton of goods across states would cost around 100 dollars or 1,265 dollars in today’s money. In the 1790s, land routes connecting the east coast and the farther western regions of the United States were undeveloped. Along with this, when weather conditions were poor land routes could not support any sort of dependable shipping by wagon, or even travel by horseback. Natural waterways provided the most dependable method of transport west of Albany. Even travel by waterway in this time period was inconvenient because these water routes were unreliable due to shallow water and raging rapids.
If mankind was to never fight back against the challenges life throws their way, then the pursuit of happiness would end on the day they stopped fighting for a finer life. Throughout America's history, people have faced dark times, nevertheless many showed that it takes not only courage and determination to fight back against the judgmental society, but action was what allowed for change to be made. Hope was not lost even if only one man survived, living had not been happy for everyone, however a better life was possible. Individuals survived through injustice from assistance of a great speaker who spoke his mind and from a group who disobeyed the law but did the right thing.