Transcontinental Railroad Research Paper

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In the history of the United States of America how many industries can say they have been around as long as the railroads? How many industries can say they connected a nation from one coast to the other? How many single industries have made as much money as the railroads? Would it not be considered a great accomplishment to be able to lay claim to just one of these, but the railroad industry can lay claim to all three. During the American Industrial Revolution, the railroad expansion became the linkage of the nation and the driving force for expansion, new resources, financial gain, and timing of daily life.
The transcontinental railroad was born after the Civil War, and has been said to have been created because the people of the nation …show more content…
The railroads required this precision which Volti depicts on page 205 with his illustration of a train engineer and conductor setting their watches to matching times (205). Volti quotes Henry David Thoreau as he spoke about the railroads:
They come and go with regularity and precision, and their whistles can be heard so far, that farmers set their clocks by them, and thus one well-regulated institution regulates a whole country. Have not men improved somewhat in punctuality since the railroad was invented? (Volti 206)
The precise timing of the railroads was to ensure a schedule just as workers were being asked to work a regular schedule.
The railroad expansion to the west aided the American Industrial Revolution by giving the country a need for technological advancements, finding of resources, making businesses millions, and created the need for precise timing. ‘The economic benefits of the railroad (and the telegraph, with the line being built right alongside the tracks) to the business traveler were obvious (Ambrose 250).” The Industrial Revolution lead to many ideas and technologies that are still used

Transcontinental Railroad Research Paper

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Transcontinental Railroad Research Paper

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