HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

The Great Road: The Building of the…
Loading...

The Great Road: The Building of the Baltimore and Ohio, the Nation's First Railroad, 1828-1853 (edition 1996)

by James Dilts

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations
55None468,075 (5)None
This masterful, richly illustrated account of the planning and building of the most important and influential early American railroad, the Baltimore and Ohio, is an essential contribution not only to railyway history but also to the broader history of the development of the United States in the first half of the nineteenth century. There was no precedent for the building of the B&O. The construction of the 380-mile line from Baltimore to the Ohio River over a period of 25 years is an epic story of astute planning and innovative engineering that overcame many formidable obstacles, notably the arduous traversing of 200 miles of mountain wilderness. Its successful inauguration provided a spur to internal improvements throughout the United States. Railroads, and certainly the B&O, epitomized progress, not only in the development and extension of the Western frontier but in the revelation that personal travel and the delivery of freight could be dramatically faster, better, and cheaper. The railroad deeply affected the development of Baltimore's port, industry, and urban geography, as well as its financial, educational, and cultural institutions. George Peabody, Enoch Pratt, William Walters, and Johns Hopkins--the city's most prominent philanthropists--were involved with the B&O, some intimately; the Johns Hopkins University was founded on B&O Railroad stock. The B&O also contributed by aiding in the growth of the state's iron and coal industries. The B&O came to be called "the Railroad University of the United States." Its civil engineers formed the core of the railroad engineering profession in America. The company's annual reports during the building of the line were, according to the American Railroad Journal in 1835, "a textbook and their road and workshops have been as a lecture room to thousands." Throughout, the author highlights the many types of men who were involved in that history: promoters, financiers, politicians, lawyers, newspaper editors, fixers and bagmen, civil engineers, inventors and mechanics, foremen, contractors, and feuding Irish laborers, who together built the first long-distance, general-purpose railroad in the United States. The book is illustrated with 80 photographs and drawings and 5 maps.… (more)
Member:bazonkers
Title:The Great Road: The Building of the Baltimore and Ohio, the Nation's First Railroad, 1828-1853
Authors:James Dilts
Info:Stanford University Press (1996), Paperback, 496 pages
Collections:Your library
Rating:
Tags:None

Work Information

The Great Road: The Building of the Baltimore and Ohio, the Nation's First Railroad, 1828-1853 by James Dilts

None
Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

No current Talk conversations about this book.

No reviews
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Dedication
First words
Quotations
Last words
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers
Original language
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC
This masterful, richly illustrated account of the planning and building of the most important and influential early American railroad, the Baltimore and Ohio, is an essential contribution not only to railyway history but also to the broader history of the development of the United States in the first half of the nineteenth century. There was no precedent for the building of the B&O. The construction of the 380-mile line from Baltimore to the Ohio River over a period of 25 years is an epic story of astute planning and innovative engineering that overcame many formidable obstacles, notably the arduous traversing of 200 miles of mountain wilderness. Its successful inauguration provided a spur to internal improvements throughout the United States. Railroads, and certainly the B&O, epitomized progress, not only in the development and extension of the Western frontier but in the revelation that personal travel and the delivery of freight could be dramatically faster, better, and cheaper. The railroad deeply affected the development of Baltimore's port, industry, and urban geography, as well as its financial, educational, and cultural institutions. George Peabody, Enoch Pratt, William Walters, and Johns Hopkins--the city's most prominent philanthropists--were involved with the B&O, some intimately; the Johns Hopkins University was founded on B&O Railroad stock. The B&O also contributed by aiding in the growth of the state's iron and coal industries. The B&O came to be called "the Railroad University of the United States." Its civil engineers formed the core of the railroad engineering profession in America. The company's annual reports during the building of the line were, according to the American Railroad Journal in 1835, "a textbook and their road and workshops have been as a lecture room to thousands." Throughout, the author highlights the many types of men who were involved in that history: promoters, financiers, politicians, lawyers, newspaper editors, fixers and bagmen, civil engineers, inventors and mechanics, foremen, contractors, and feuding Irish laborers, who together built the first long-distance, general-purpose railroad in the United States. The book is illustrated with 80 photographs and drawings and 5 maps.

No library descriptions found.

Book description
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (5)
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5 2

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 203,239,118 books! | Top bar: Always visible