Iron Trails 13 Railroads in 1860

By the mid-19th century, railroads had become the sinews of American commerce and the backbone of its expansion. This burgeoning network of iron rails crisscrossed vast swathes of the American landscape, shrinking the immense distances that had once isolated communities and hindered growth. The railroad's advent heralded an era of unprecedented economic transformation, knitting together a fragmented economy into a national market. It facilitated the rapid movement of goods, people, and ideas, catalyzing industrial growth and urbanization at an unprecedented scale.

In this episode, we conclude our exploration of early American railroads, a period spanning from their genesis in the late 1820s to the eve of the Civil War. Having broadly covered their growth up to 1860, we now turn our focus to a snapshot of the American railroad landscape in that pivotal year.

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