When the scheme for the construction of a railroad from Baltimore to the waters of the Ohio River first began to take form, the United States had barely emerged from the Revolutionary period.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
With the reorganization of 1898 finished, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad entered a new period in its history.
Yet, in 1850 nearly all the railroads in the United States lay east of the Mississippi River, and all of them, even when they were physically mere extensions of one another, were separately owned and separately managed.
This is our history - from the Transcontinental Railroad to the Hoover Dam, to the dredging of our ports and building of our most historic bridges - our American ancestors prioritized growth and investment in our nation's infrastructure.
The United States as we know it today is largely the result of mechanical inventions, and in particular of agricultural machinery and the railroad.
You look at the steamboat, the railroad, the car, the airplane - not all of these were invented in the Anglo-American world, but they were popularized and extended by it. They were made possible by the financial architecture, the capital intensive operations invented and developed by the Anglo-Americans.
The railroad originally was as completely dissociated from steam propulsion as was the ship.
The history of the Erie Railroad ever since 1901 has been a record of progress.
As well might it be said that, because we are ignorant of the laws by which metals are produced and trees developed, we cannot know anything of the origin of steamships and railways.
Millions upon millions of people came here full of hope and aspiration to this extraordinary land of liberty and opportunity, and helped build the United States. So the Atlantic Ocean was absolutely critical to the story of America.
Oh, the Irish were building the railroads down through Mexico, through Chihuahua. They finished the railroads when they finished out in the West Coast, and they went down and put the trains into Mexico.