The Great Railroad Revolution

This book is about a lot more than railroading. While delivering on his title, Wolmar also draws together 19th and 20th Century American history; offers a worked example of the industrial lifecycle; and illustrates human-technology interaction. Wolmar is an award-winning British journalist and politician who has authored more than ten books on railroading.Before railroads, distance governed America, especially beyond waterways. Food and materials needed local production, and timely communications were unknown. Beginning in the1830s railroads started a process of linking up America, first locally and ultimately nationally. Financiers and politicians saw railroads as an enabler for settling the country. They arranged huge land grants for railroads, who in turn sold the land to settlers. Railroads actively recruited new emigrants in England and Europe, creating demand for the land. Later, railroads enabled construction of bedroom communities, giving rise to an ongoing real estate boom and suburban sprawl. Wolmar asserts that America could not have developed as it has without railroads and that railroads were and are a driver/magnifier of our national wealth.At first, America fell in love with railroads. As time passed, the railroads matured, became a mainstay that ultimately brought Chesapeake Bay oysters to Kansas City. Railroads created thousands of jobs directly and in related industries. Timely transport and communications extended the reach of federal and state governments and enabled the rise of national businesses. Too, labor relations and strikes became issues as unions organized, seeking better wages and working conditions. A series of high-profile financial scandals, strikes, and railroad disasters soured the romance, and gave rise to the Interstate Commerce Commission’s often misguided regulation, which did much to undermine American railroading.In one interesting thread, the author shows that the enormous carnage and destruction of the American Civil War would not have been possible without railroads to quickly move armies, munitions, and supplies over relatively long distances. The Union’s superior railroad networks and expertise were key to winning the war. The Confederacy’s preference for states’ rights and fear of national government limited the South’s railroad development and ability to fight as an integrated force.Another theme illustrates employment shifts in emerging industrial infrastructures. Initially, many functions were human centered, but as jobs were automated, the need for human labor declined. This pattern seems apparent in many other contemporary businesses, and managing the conflict between rising productivity and potential human labor dislocations remains a significant social problem.Wolmar convinces me that much of what we love and hate about America started in railroading. Folks who engineer, regulate, and use modern enterprise should read Wolmar’s account of this public-private technology. The story illustrated the downsides of both over and under regulation. Happily, modern freight railroading operates profitably and serves Americans’ needs. There is hope that with thoughtful governance, passenger/commuter rail can play a larger role in reducing congestion on our crowded streets and highways and also in curtailing related emissions

I really enjoyed this book. Lots of history of which I wasn't aware of which I was rather surprised to find out. Just fascinating! My only criticism would be the way the chapters and paragraphs were laid out. Once you started a chapter, there wasn't a break anywhere where you could stop. And when a paragraph is sometimes a page and a half long and it takes sometimes an hour and a half to read each chapter, if you're forced to put the book down for any reason, you find yourself having to go back and reread what you've already read just to pick up the thread. This is a great book that I feel should be required reading and I do recommend this book. It's just the structure of the chapters and paragraphs could use some work.

This is a great, well written book. Never boring to read. Highly recommend.

“The Great Railroad Revolution” by Christian Wolmar Wolmar does an excellent job of presenting the history of our railroads – most notably by “showing them in three dimension”. That's to say he brings changing railroads and their changing times and fortunes to Life. This book is a saga, not a dry recital of rail trivia and out-of-context factoids. Anyone with an interest in railroads should find this a thorough, and thoroughly interesting, treatise on an important player in our national development as a People as well as a nation.

We got this as a gift for a friend he loved it.

Although fascinating, this volume was more about the financial and political aspects of the railroads - things that made them hopeless, possibly since their beginning - and less about the experience of either working on or being a passenger on the railroads. Still, it was a great read, packed with very valuable information, and I think a sympathetic view of what came to be the most important infrastructure improvement in the formation of the country. Lots of wonderful detail humanized the vast amount of information provided. Definitely NOT a dry read.

This is a very well written book, that really does an excellent job of summarizing America's railroad history.Very important volume, that describes the entire progression of the American railroad industry from its infancy. That is significant as America took the English invention of railroads and ran with it to great prosperity up though the present.The writer, who comes form England writes clearly and to the point, as well as picking his factual points with finesse.As a former rail industry executive, I think that he does a nicely balanced job of covering both the railway labor and regulatory issues.Finally, the Author does not disappear into the nostalgia for the industry and the rail fan orientation that railroads of the past inhabited some magical place. He writers in an overall balanced style that conveys the majesty and the impact and the pure innovation that made the American Railroad network and industry to best in the world. .

A great book for any railroad enthusiast. Much interesting and engaging details about the people and economics of railroads. Also sheds light on the disappearance of commercial passenger travel.

As the first book Wolmar writes about railways that are not in his own country (U.K.), this is a very fine work about the history of railroad in the U.S., approaching every aspect of rail and economic development of the country and how the railroads were essencial in turning the U.S. in the world's leading economic powerhouse. And also, Wolmar shows us how the progressive regulation and posterior decline of railroads is synchronized with the corrosion of liberties that made the U.S. the world's powerhouse. And even today, after the deregulation promoted by the Staggers Rail Act in 1980, american railroads are in some aspects, a shadow of their former selves, with Amtrak running only a skeleton of what once was the passenger network and several shorelines struggling to survive against road competition, despite their flourishment in the recent decades.

Provided the information on the history of US railroads .... the purpose.

i'm making an investigation for my thesis, and i've needed something that can introducing to me to the US railway history in 19th century, i think its an important book. But i tought its was better of for my intentions in the investigation, however maybe i can read the rest when i'll finish the work to learn more... maybe its a book for motherlanguage english speaker. for a latino as me i recomen have an elementary english level.------------------Estoy haciendo una investigación para mi tesis, y necesito algo que pueda introducirme en la historia del ferrocarril de Estados Unidos en el siglo XIX, creo que es un libro importante. Pero pensé que era mejor para mis intenciones en la investigación, sin embargo, tal vez pueda leer el resto cuando termine el trabajo para aprender más ... tal vez sea un libro para hablantes nativos de inglés. para un latino como yo recomiendo tener un nivel de inglés elemental.

A very revealing and well researched book about the growth of RAILROADS in the USand its contribution in making US a world power

It would be hard not to find this book (or subject) interesting: historically, geographically, politically, commercially and technologically. But do not expect a light read. The book is detailed and entailed considerable research.We meet people such as Charles Dickens and Abraham Lincoln and learn about the great importance of railways in the Civil War: "the world's first railway war". I was not fully aware of the disruption caused by the railroads to the Native American way of life, and certainly not aware of the remarkable degree of corruption and the resultant inefficiencies and expense involved in building the railways to and from the Pacific. The celebrations surrounding the completion of the link seem to have been quite something but it took some time for it to be greatly utilised.The background to the development of the of the Pacific railways is interesting in various respects. They would not succeed unless the routes were populated and so major efforts were made to attract immigrants, including inaccurate weather forecasting (still with us today!). The phrases "Wild West", "How the West was won" and "Go West, young man" are placed in context (as is "Cowboys and Indians"). The book also highlights the many safety hazards involved in nineteenth century rail travel. The train robbers seem to have acquired Ned Kelly status. There is also an industrial relations backdrop, as in so many fields of employment: exploitation by the employers leading ultimately to powerful unions and uneconomic working practices.Later we come across railway barons, some with names still famous today, and the advent of luxury travel and long distance journeys with almost cruise-type facilities. But before too long the saga of the sad decline sets in. However, to some extent this is countered by the remarkable turn round and success of the freight railroad service in recent years. Any revival of passenger services is more patchy and America seems unprepared for the efficient high speed trains of western Europe. Indeed, I was interested to read the reference to "hostility to the very idea of rail, often presented as an alien socialist concept by right wing politicians": I understand that Margaret Thatcher refused to travel by train.It is difficult to over-estimate the effect that the railway had on the USA, in things as diverse as the economy, commerce, tourism, sport and leisure. I wouldn't call myself a railway buff, but I learnt quite a lot from this book, and not only about railways.