The Great Railroad Revolution

The Great Railroad Revolution

Author: Christian Wolmar

Publisher: PublicAffairs

Published: 2012-09-25

Total Pages: 450

ISBN-13: 1610391802

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America was made by the railroads. The opening of the Baltimore & Ohio line -- the first American railroad -- in the 1830s sparked a national revolution in the way that people lived thanks to the speed and convenience of train travel. Promoted by visionaries and built through heroic effort, the American railroad network was bigger in every sense than Europe's, and facilitated everything from long-distance travel to commuting and transporting goods to waging war. It united far-flung parts of the country, boosted economic development, and was the catalyst for America's rise to world-power status. Every American town, great or small, aspired to be connected to a railroad and by the turn of the century, almost every American lived within easy access of a station. By the early 1900s, the United States was covered in a latticework of more than 200,000 miles of railroad track and a series of magisterial termini, all built and controlled by the biggest corporations in the land. The railroads dominated the American landscape for more than a hundred years but by the middle of the twentieth century, the automobile, the truck, and the airplane had eclipsed the railroads and the nation started to forget them. In The Great Railroad Revolution, renowned railroad expert Christian Wolmar tells the extraordinary story of the rise and the fall of the greatest of all American endeavors, and argues that the time has come for America to reclaim and celebrate its often-overlooked rail heritage.


The Great Railway Bazaar

The Great Railway Bazaar

Author: Paul Theroux

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Published: 2006-06-01

Total Pages: 406

ISBN-13: 054752515X

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The acclaimed author recounts his epic journey across Europe and Asia in this international bestselling classic of travel literature: “Compulsive reading” (Graham Greene). In 1973, Paul Theroux embarked on a four-month journey by train from the United Kingdom through Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. In The Great Railway Bazaar, he records in vivid detail and penetrating insight the many fascinating incidents, adventures, and encounters of his grand, intercontinental tour. Asia's fabled trains—the Orient Express, the Khyber Pass Local, the Frontier Mail, the Golden Arrow to Kuala Lumpur, the Mandalay Express, the Trans-Siberian Express—are the stars of a journey that takes Theroux on a loop eastbound from London's Victoria Station to Tokyo Central, then back from Japan on the Trans-Siberian. Brimming with Theroux's signature humor and wry observations, this engrossing chronicle is essential reading for both the ardent adventurer and the armchair traveler.


Nothing Like It In the World

Nothing Like It In the World

Author: Stephen E. Ambrose

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2001-11-06

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 9780743203173

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The story of the men who build the transcontinental railroad in the 1860's.


The Great Train Race

The Great Train Race

Author: Allan Mitchell

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2000-09-01

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 178238197X

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From their origins, railways produced an intense competition between the two major continental systems in France and Germany. Fitting a new technology into existing political institutions and social habits, these two nations became inexorably involved in industrial and commercial rivalry that eventually escalated into the armed conflict of 1914. Based on many years of research in French and German archives, this study examines the adaptation of railroads and steam engines from Britain to the continent of Europe after the Napoleonic age. A fascinating example of how the same technology, borrowed at the same time from the same source, was assimilated differently by the two continental powers, this book offers a groundbreaking analysis of the crossroads of technology and politics during the first Industrial Revolution.


The Railway Journey

The Railway Journey

Author: Wolfgang Schivelbusch

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2014-05-06

Total Pages: 246

ISBN-13: 0520957903

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The impact of constant technological change upon our perception of the world is so pervasive as to have become a commonplace of modern society. But this was not always the case; as Wolfgang Schivelbusch points out in this fascinating study, our adaptation to technological change—the development of our modern, industrialized consciousness—was very much a learned behavior. In The Railway Journey, Schivelbusch examines the origins of this industrialized consciousness by exploring the reaction in the nineteenth century to the first dramatic avatar of technological change, the railroad. In a highly original and engaging fashion, Schivelbusch discusses the ways in which our perceptions of distance, time, autonomy, speed, and risk were altered by railway travel. As a history of the surprising ways in which technology and culture interact, this book covers a wide range of topics, including the changing perception of landscapes, the death of conversation while traveling, the problematic nature of the railway compartment, the space of glass architecture, the pathology of the railway journey, industrial fatigue and the history of shock, and the railroad and the city. Belonging to a distinguished European tradition of critical sociology best exemplified by the work of Georg Simmel and Walter Benjamin, The Railway Journey is anchored in rich empirical data and full of striking insights about railway travel, the industrial revolution, and technological change. Now updated with a new preface, The Railway Journey is an invaluable resource for readers interested in nineteenth-century culture and technology and the prehistory of modern media and digitalization.


Blood, Iron, and Gold

Blood, Iron, and Gold

Author: Christian Wolmar

Publisher: PublicAffairs

Published: 2010-03-02

Total Pages: 428

ISBN-13: 1586488511

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The opening of the world's first railroad in Britain and America in 1830 marked the dawn of a new age. Within the course of a decade, tracks were being laid as far afield as Australia and Cuba, and by the outbreak of World War I, the United States alone boasted over a quarter of a million miles. With unrelenting determination, architectural innovation, and under gruesome labor conditions, a global railroad network was built that forever changed the way people lived. From Panama to Punjab, from Tasmania to Turin, Christian Wolmar shows how cultures were enriched, and destroyed, by one of the greatest global transport revolutions of our time, and celebrates the visionaries and laborers responsible for its creation.


Fire and Steam

Fire and Steam

Author: Christian Wolmar

Publisher: Atlantic Books

Published: 2008-05-01

Total Pages: 332

ISBN-13: 1848872615

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Now in paperback, Fire and Steam tells the dramatic story of the people and events that shaped the world's first railway network, one of the most impressive engineering achievements in history. The opening of the pioneering Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1830 marked the beginning of the railways' vital role in changing the face of Britain. Fire and Steam celebrates the vision and determination of the ambitious Victorian pioneers who developed this revolutionary transport system and the navvies who cut through the land to enable a country-wide network to emerge. The rise of the steam train allowed goods and people to circulate around Britain as never before, stimulating the growth of towns and industry, as well many of the facets of modern life, from fish and chips to professional football. From the early days of steam to electrification, via the railways' magnificent contribution in two world wars, the checkered history of British Rail, and the buoyant future of the train, Fire and Steam examines the social and economical importance of the railway and how it helped to form the Britain of today.


China's Great Train

China's Great Train

Author: Abrahm Lustgarten

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2009-05-12

Total Pages: 342

ISBN-13: 9780805090185

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Lustgarten's book is a timely and provocative account of China's unstoppable quest to build a railway into Tibet, and the nation's obsession to transform its land and its people.


The Complete Book of North American Railroading

The Complete Book of North American Railroading

Author: Kevin EuDaly

Publisher: Crestline Books

Published: 2016-09

Total Pages: 355

ISBN-13: 0785833897

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Celebrate over 150 years of the North American railroad with this visual history. You'll be amazed by over 400 modern and vintages photographs of these trains!


The Greatest Railroad Story Ever Told

The Greatest Railroad Story Ever Told

Author: Seth H. Bramson

Publisher: Arcadia Publishing

Published: 2011-11-01

Total Pages: 193

ISBN-13: 1625844530

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All aboard for the history of one of the most audacious and innovative railroad engineering feats in history from the celebrated Floridian author. Although several people had considered constructing a railroad to Key West beginning in the early 1800s, it took a bold industrialist with unparalleled vision to make it happen. In 1902, Henry Flagler made the decision to extend the Florida East Coast Railway to “the nearest deepwater American port.” In this book, renowned Florida historian Seth H. Bramson reveals how the Key West Extension of the Flagler-owned FEC became the greatest railroad engineering and construction feat in United States, and possibly world, history, an accomplishment that would cement Flagler’s fame and legend for all time. Join Bramson as he recounts the years of operation of this great railroad, what it did for the Florida Keys and what it meant to the resident conchs. Includes photos