A transcontinental railroad or transcontinental railway is contiguous railroad trackage, that crosses a continental land mass and has terminals at different oceans or continental borders. Such networks can be via the tracks of either a single railroad or over those owned or controlled by multiple railway companies along a continuous route. Although Europe is crisscrossed by railways, the railroads within Europe are usually not considered transcontinental, with the possible exception of the historic Orient Express. Transcontinental railroads helped open up interior regions of continents not previously colonized to exploration and settlement that would not otherwise have been feasible. In many cases they also formed the backbones of cross-country passenger and freight transportation networks. Many of them continue to have an important role in freight transportation and some like the Trans-Siberian Railway even have passenger trains going from one end to the other.
Jason Gould was an American railroad magnate and financial speculator who is generally identified as one of the robber barons of the Gilded Age. His sharp and often unscrupulous business practices made him one of the wealthiest men of the late nineteenth century. Gould was an unpopular figure during his life and remains controversial.
John Pierpont Morgan was an American financier and investment banker who dominated corporate finance on Wall Street throughout the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. As the head of the banking firm that ultimately became known as J.P. Morgan and Co., he was a driving personal force behind the wave of industrial consolidations in the United States at the turn of the twentieth century.
The Crédit Mobilier scandal was a two-part fraud conducted from 1864 to 1867 by the Union Pacific Railroad and the Crédit Mobilier of America construction company in the building of the eastern portion of the first transcontinental railroad. The story was broken by The New York Sun during the 1872 campaign of Ulysses S. Grant.
The Northern Pacific Railway was a transcontinental railroad that operated across the northern tier of the western United States, from Minnesota to the Pacific Northwest. It was approved by Congress in 1864 and given nearly 40 million acres of land grants, which it used to raise money in Europe for construction.
The Erie Railroad was a railroad that operated in the Northeastern United States, originally connecting Pavonia Terminal in Jersey City, New Jersey, with Lake Erie at Dunkirk, New York. The railroad expanded west to Chicago following its 1865 merger with the former Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, also known as the New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio Railroad. Its mainline route proved influential in the development and economic growth of the Southern Tier of New York state, including the cities of Binghamton, Elmira, and Hornell. The Erie Railroad repair shops were located in Hornell and was Hornell's largest employer. Hornell was also where Erie's mainline split into two routes with one proceeding northwest to Buffalo and the other west to Chicago.
The Louisville and Nashville Railroad, commonly called the L&N, was a Class I railroad that operated freight and passenger services in the southeast United States.
The Colorado Central Railroad was a U.S. railroad company that operated in Colorado and southeastern Wyoming in the late 19th century. It was founded in the Colorado Territory in the wake of the Colorado Gold Rush to ship gold from the mountains. It expanded from its Golden–Denver line to form a crucial link connecting Colorado with the transcontinental railroad and the national rail network. The history of the railroad throughout the 1870s was driven at times by a fierce struggle between local interests, led by W.A.H. Loveland, and outside investors of the Union Pacific Railroad led at times by Jay Gould. The early struggle of the company to build its lines was a major part of the early competition between Denver and Golden for supremacy as the principal metropolis of Colorado.
The Atlanta and West Point Rail Road was a railroad in the U.S. state of Georgia, forming the east portion of the Atlanta-Selma West Point Route. The company was chartered in 1847 as the Atlanta and LaGrange Rail Road and renamed in 1857; construction of the 5 ft gauge line was begun in 1849-50 and completed in May 1854. A large minority interest owned by the Georgia Railroad and Banking Company eventually passed under the control of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad (ACL), which later acquired a majority of the stock.
The Central Branch Union Pacific Railroad was a railroad in the U.S. state of Kansas. Originally planned as a line from Atchison west into Colorado, and given federal land grants by the Pacific Railway Act of 1862 as one of the branches of the Union Pacific Railroad, it was left with a hanging end at Waterville, Kansas, when the Union Pacific Railway, Eastern Division, with which it was to connect, changed its route. The line was acquired by the Union Pacific through a stock purchase by Jay Gould and leased to the Missouri Pacific Railroad in 1880. In 1909 the Central Branch was merged into the Missouri Pacific; the latter company came back into the Union Pacific system in 1982. In 1991 the remaining trackage west of Frankfort was leased to the Kyle Railroad.
The Royal Gorge Route Railroad is a heritage railroad based in Cañon City, Colorado. A 1950s-era train makes daily 2-hour excursion runs from the Santa Fe Depot through the Royal Gorge along a famous section of the former Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad.
The Manhattan Railway Company was an elevated railway company in Manhattan and the Bronx, New York City, United States. It operated four lines: the Second Avenue Line, Third Avenue Line, Sixth Avenue Line, and Ninth Avenue Line.
Sidney Dillon was an American railroad executive and one of the US's premier railroad builders.
The Utah Division of the former Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad (D&RGW) is a rail line that connects Grand Junction, Colorado and Salt Lake City, Utah in the Western United States. It is now incorporated into the Union Pacific Railroad (UP) system as part of the Central Corridor. The modern Union Pacific has split the line into two subdivisions for operational purposes, the Green River Subdivision between Grand Junction and Helper, Utah and the Provo Subdivision from Helper to Salt Lake City. Daily passenger service is provided by Amtrak's California Zephyr; the BNSF Railway and Utah Railway have trackage rights over the line.
The Gould transcontinental system was a system of railroads assembled by George Jay Gould I and the Fuller Syndicate in the early 1900s. This was Gould's attempt to fulfill a goal of his late father, financier Jay Gould. Due to financial troubles following the Panic of 1907, the system was never completed as a fully transcontinental line.
LeGrand Lockwood, was a businessman and financier in New York City in the late 19th century. He built the Lockwood–Mathews Mansion in Norwalk, Connecticut.
The Erie War was a 19th-century conflict between American financiers for control of the Erie Railway Company, which owned and operated the Erie Railroad. Built with public funds raised by taxation and on land donated by public officials and private developers, by the middle of the 1850s the railroad was mismanaged and heavily in debt. A cattle drover turned Wall Street banker and broker, Daniel Drew, at first loaned $2 million to the railroad, and then acquired control over it. He amassed a fortune by skillfully manipulating the Erie railroad shares on the New York Stock Exchange. Cornelius Vanderbilt, who set his mind on building a railroad empire, saw multiple business and financial opportunities in railways and decided in 1866 to corner the market on Erie by silently scooping-up the Erie railroad stock. After succeeding, Vanderbilt permitted Drew to stay on the board of directors in his former capacity as treasurer.
The West Jersey and Seashore Railroad (WJ&S) was a Pennsylvania Railroad subsidiary in the U.S. state of New Jersey with a connection to Philadelphia. It was formed through the merger of several smaller roads in May 1896. At the end of 1925 it operated 379 miles (610 km) of road on 717 miles (1,154 km) of track; that year it reported 166 million ton-miles of revenue freight and 332 million passenger-miles. The railroad became part of Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines in 1933.
Charles Elliott Perkins was an American businessman and president of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. He was so well respected that historian Richard Overton wrote, "From the time that Charles Elliott Perkins became vice president of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy [1876] ... until he resigned as president in 1901, he was the Burlington."
The Cleveland and Mahoning Valley Railroad (C&MV) was a shortline railroad operating in the state of Ohio in the United States. Originally known as the Cleveland and Mahoning Railroad (C&M), it was chartered in 1848. Construction of the line began in 1853 and was completed in 1857. After an 1872 merger with two small railroads, the corporate name was changed to "Cleveland and Mahoning Valley Railroad". The railroad leased itself to the Atlantic and Great Western Railway in 1863. The C&MV suffered financial instability, and in 1880 its stock was sold to a company based in London in the United Kingdom. A series of leases and ownership changes left the C&MV in the hands of the Erie Railroad in 1896. The CM&V's corporate identity ended in 1942 after the Erie Railroad completed purchasing the railroad's outstanding stock from the British investors.
