Late in 1940, the young men of the 2nd Battalion, 131st Field Artillery Regiment stepped off the trucks at Camp Bowie in Brownwood, Texas, ready to complete the training they would need for active duty in World War II. Many of them had grown up together in Jacksboro, Texas, and …
In 1789, when the First Congress met in New York City, the members traveled to the capital just as Roman senators two thousand years earlier had journeyed to Rome, by horse, at a pace of some five miles an hour. Indeed, if sea travel had improved dramatically since Caesar's time…
This history of rail transportation in America examines the railroad's importance to our country. The railroad was America's first major industry, and it made possible or promoted the growth of all other industries, among them coal, steel, flour milling, and commercial farming. …
Sitting at the heart of the Raj's project to 'improve' India, the construction of railways began as a 'liberal' experiment in 1853: to promote trade and commerce, to distribute food, and to facilitate the movement of troops. This study focuses in on what was the largest investme…
Few scenes capture the American experience so eloquently as that of a lonely train chugging across the vastness of the Great Plains, or snaking through tortuous high mountain passes. Although this vision was eclipsed for a time by the rise of air travel and trucking, railroads h…
Few scenes capture the American experience so eloquently as that of a lonely train chugging across the vastness of the Great Plains, or snaking through tortuous high mountain passes. Although this vision was eclipsed for a time by the rise of air travel and trucking, railroads h…
"In 1848, a group of ambitious American entrepreneurs decided to embark upon a remarkable engineering feat-they would build a railroad across the Isthmus of Panama to connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The creation of the Panama Railroad ranks as one the boldest capitalist…
"British railway enthusiasm traces this post-war cohort, and those which followed, as they invigorated different sectors in the world of railway enthusiasm - train spotting, railway modelling, collecting railway relics - and then, in response to the demise of main-line steam tra…