TransContinental Railroad Essay Research Paper If any — страница 2

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States was entering a deep economic depression. ?Considerable blame was heaped upon the Northern Pacific Company because of its wild scheme to ?build a railroad through the wilderness to nowhere?? 10 By 1875, work had resumed on both ends of the railroad. In 1883, the Northern Pacific had completed its construction and the final spike was driven in about sixty miles west of Helena, Montana at Gold Creek. This marked the completion of the nation?s second transcontinental railroad, and the first one built by a single company.11 In 1883, a German immigrant named Henry Villard obtained control of the Northern Pacific. He connected it to the line of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company, which also bought the Oregon Steamship Company which provided service from Portland to San

Francisco. Previously, in 1879, he had gained control of the Oregon Steam Navigation Company and had begun building a railroad along the south bank of the Columbia River to its junction with the Snake River. Villard formed a new corporation, the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company. He planned to make Portland the trade outlet of the Northwest. However, in 1884, Villard lost control of his two lines. His partners from the Puget Sound area wasted no time in building a link from the Snake River over the Cascade Mountains to Tacoma, bypassing Portland. Villard was not one to give up. ?In 1889, he organized the Oregon Transcontinental Company. It took over the Northern Pacific and shared ownership of the OR and N with the Union Pacific.? 12 The depression of 1873 brought the dream

of a lifetime to a Canadian citizen by the name of James J. Hill. He had come to the United States with the purpose of making his fortune. He later received the nickname ?the empire builder? because of his remarkable achievements. He was a storekeeper in St. Paul, Minnesota, when he and a partner founded the Red River Transportation Company, which was a financial success. He began dreaming of a ?Northwest Empire? and the trade opportunities that access to the pacific coast would offer. In 1878, Hill and a group of Canadians bought out the almost non-existent St. Paul and Pacific Railroad and began expanding, changing the name of the railroad to the Great Northern. Hill?s goal was the Pacific and beyond. 13 ?In 1889, Hill committed himself to a railroad to the Pacific Northwest.

He did not know if he and his associates had the financial resources?but did know that a newly constructed, properly engineered and financed railway would be far more profitable than the ramshackle Northern Pacific. Thus was born the Great Northern Railway.? 14 The Great Northern was unique in that it was built solely by private capital and received no outside aid or land grants from the United States government. In addition, it was the only rail line to finance itself on a ?pay-as-you-go? basis. It encouraged agricultural development settlement rather than being dependent on government land grants.15 Therefore, it did not attract the huge financial interests and commercial development, which followed other rail lines. This self-sufficient basis of operation also allowed the

Great Northern to stand strong in the face of the economic depressions, which bankrupted other railways. The final spike was driven on January 6, 1893, but, unlike the Northern Pacific for which passenger service began the day after the final spike was driven, passenger service on the Great Northern did not reach Seattle until June of that year. By that time, the United States was entering its worst depression so far. Newcomers traveling by rail poured into the region, especially into Washington at a rate unimaginable only a decade earlier. ?Cities and farms transformed the landscape, and large-scale business enterprises and organized labor attained prominence and power not possessed before.?16 The results of railroad construction in the Pacific Northwest were momentous. The

railroad enormously expanded the territory tributary to the port cities of Portland, Tacoma, and Seattle. Although these cities fought over the trade of the interior, they increased it immensely over the days of the Columbia-Willamette route. The railroad encouraged the flow of immigration to the region. ?Most of those who produced the great population increase of these years and contributed to its greater homogeneity were relieved in body and pocketbook to come by train rather than by covered wagon or by ship.?17 The railroad redefined the economy for the northwest region. It opened opportunities for nationwide markets for local products such as wheat and timber. People who had been dependent on local merchants as their only source of supply, and having to pay whatever costs the