Essays on Transcontinental Railroad

Introduction

Throughout history, Chinese people have been migrating to USA in search for greener passage. From 1826 to 1950, they were booking their passage on ships like occidental and oriental steamship company, and pacific mail Steamship Company to travel. The money that they required to fund their journey was mostly borrowed from family members, commercial lenders or district associations. The first Chinese people to arrive in Los Angeles were men, who specialized in manual work. Their work mainly included gardening, laundry, road builders or ranch work. The migration of Chinese people from china was localized and controlled through parts of ...

Around the World in Eighty Days is an early example of an adventure novel written by Jules Verne (1873). Although now best known for his science fiction, this adventure novel set at the time of its publishing was Verne’s most popular work during his lifetime (Lottman, 1995). This story glorifies the recent advances in transportation and brings the newly opened world, now made smaller and more assessable, to the attention of a popular readership. It is difficult in this time of globalization and instant ability to communicate anywhere in the world to try to perceive how adventuresome and amazing ...

The history of western settlement in the United States is linked closely with the history of railroad construction. Immigrants were integral in the construction of the American transcontinental railroads, which facilitated the expansion to the west, and they used the railroad to migrate and settle in the west. This paper will discuss the importance of railroads in the settlement of the west in the 19th century and onwards. With the completion of the transcontinental railroad after the Civil War opened the west for economic development and settlement. White settlers started to pour across the Mississippi to ranch, mine ...

Asian immigrants were, for many years, the silent victims of American westward expansion. When Americans were expanding westward in pursuit of Manifest Destiny, they were not doing all the work themselves. Manifest Destiny was the widely-held belief by many Americans that America was destined to expand across the current-day United States. During the 1820s all the way through the 1860s, Americans from the east coast of the United States expanded across the United States, seeking a variety of different things-- some sought land, others new experiences or natural resources. Everyone who participated in the American westward expansion carried some kind ...

1. Expansion of Federal Government Since the Late 1800’s Expansion of federal government powers accelerated after the American Civil War, which – according to an article by Holcombe (1997) – established the federal government’s supremacy over the individual states. The picture below illustrates the tragedy of war and in particular the “American versus American” aspect of the war, which resulted in massive casualties to Americans on both sides in the conflict. The war cost millions of lives as well as breakdowns in previous relationships. Former friends and even family members became divided by allegiance to their chosen cause, ...

Introduction

The Federal government promoted development in the Northwest Pacific area by chartering the railroad companies and granting them land grants. There were sixty railroads that received various land grants from the government. The land given by the government was over 130 thousand acres. The cost of building the railroad varied from $ 21,000 to $ 30,000 (Raugust, 2009). For each mile of land that the company received they would sell on cash or credit. This sale would therefore finance the construction of the railway. The companies would therefore own the land at no cost and sell it to finance ...