Download or read book Travel On Southern Antebellum Railroads 1828 1860 written by Eugene Alvarez and published by University of Alabama Press. This book was released on 2007-08-23 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Railroading in its heyday

Download or read book Railroads in the Old South written by Aaron W. Marrs and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2009-04-13 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An original history of the railroad in the Old South that challenges the accepted understanding of economic and industrial growth in antebellum America. Drawing from both familiar and overlooked sources, such as the personal diaries of Southern travelers, papers and letters from civil engineers, corporate records, and contemporary newspaper accounts, Aaron W. Marrs skillfully expands on the conventional business histories that have characterized scholarship in this field. He situates railroads in the fullness of antebellum life, examining how slavery, technology, labor, social convention, and the environment shaped their evolution. Far from seeing the Old South as backward and premodern, Marrs finds evidence of urban life, industry, and entrepreneurship throughout the region. But these signs of progress existed alongside efforts to preserve traditional ways of life. Railroads exemplified Southerners’ pursuit of progress on their own terms: developing modern transportation while retaining a conservative social order. Railroads in the Old South demonstrates that a simple approach to the Old South fails to do justice to its complexity and contradictions. “The time is right to bring the South into the story of the economic transformation of antebellum America. Aaron Marrs does this with force and grace in Railroads in the Old South.” —John L. Larson, Purdue University “I am hard pressed to think of another volume that better catches the overall effect railroads had on the Old South.” —Kenneth W. Noe, Auburn University “Interesting regional history . . . It is a thoughtful and instructive study that examines not only the pervasiveness of transportation but also some of the social, political, and economic consequences associated with the evolution of southern railroads.” —Choice

Download or read book Urban Growth and City Systems in the United States 1840 1860 written by Allan Pred and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1980 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this major new work of urban geography, Allan Pred interprets the process by which major cities grew and the entire city-system of the United States developed during the antebellum decades. The book focuses on the availability and distribution of crucial economic information. For as cities developed, this information helped determine the new urban areas in which business opportunities could be exploited and productive innovations implemented. Pred places this original approach to urbanization in the context of earlier, more conventional studies, and he supports his view by a wealth of evidence regarding the flow of commodities between major cities. He also draws on an analysis of newspaper circulation, postal services, business travel, and telegraph usage. Pred's book goes far beyond the usual "biographies" of individual cities or the specialized studies of urban life. It offers a large and fascinating view of the way an entire city-system was put together and made to function. Indeed, by providing the first full account of these two decades of American urbanization, Pred has supplied a vital and hitherto missing link in the history of the United States.

Download or read book American Railroads written by John F. Stover and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2008-04-15 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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 have enjoyed a rebirth in recent years as profitable freight carriers. A fascinating account of the rise, decline, and rebirth of railroads in the United States, John F. Stover's American Railroads traces their history from the first lines that helped eastern seaports capture western markets to today's newly revitalized industry. Stover describes the growth of the railroads' monopoly, with the consequent need for state and federal regulations; relates the vital part played by the railroads during the Civil War and the two World Wars; and charts the railroads' decline due to the advent of air travel and trucking during the 1950s. In two new chapters, Stover recounts the remarkable recovery of the railroads, along with other pivotal events of the industry's recent history. During the 1960s declining passenger traffic and excessive federal regulation led to the federally-financed creation of Amtrak to revive passenger service and Conrail to provide freight service on bankrupt northeastern railroads. The real savior for the railroads, though, proved to be the Staggers Rail Act of 1980, which brought prosperity to rail freight carriers by substantially deregulating the industry. By 1995, renewed railroad freight traffic had reached nearly twice its former peak in 1944. Bringing both a seasoned eye and new insights to bear on one of the most American of industries, Stover has produced the definitive history of railroads in the United States.

Download or read book The Rise of the Urban South written by Lawrence H. Larsen and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2021-12-14 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Operating under an outmoded system of urban development and faced by the vicissitudes of the Civil War and Reconstruction, southerners in the nineteenth century built a network of cities that met the needs of their society. In this pioneering exploration of that intricate story, Lawrence H. Larsen shows that in the antebellum period, southern entrepreneurs built cities in layers to facilitate the movement of cotton. First came the colonial cities, followed by those of the piedmont, the New West, the Gulf Coast, and the interior. By the Civil War, cotton could move by a combination of road, rail, and river through a network of cities—for example, from Jackson to Memphis to New Orleans to Europe. In the Gilded Age, building on past practices, the South continued to make urban gains. Men like Henry Grady of Atlanta and Henry Watterson of Louisville used broader regional objectives to promote their own cities. Grady successfully sold Atlanta, one of the most southern of cities demographically, as a city with a northern outlook; Watterson tied Louisville to national goals in railroad building. The New South movement did not succeed in bringing the region to parity with the rest of the nation, yet the South continued to rise along older lines. By 1900, far from being a failure in terms of the general course of American development, the South had created an urban system suited to its needs, while avoiding the promotional frenzy that characterized the building of cities in the North. Based upon federal and local sources, this book will become the standard work on nineteenth-century southern urbanization, a subject too long unexplored.

Download or read book A House Dividing written by John Majewski and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2000-06-19 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comparing Virginia and Pennsylvania, Majewski explains how slavery undermined the development of the southern economy.

Download or read book The Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom in the Old Southwest written by John Hebron Moore and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 1988-01-01 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Old South's Cotton Kingdom arose simultaneously in two widely separated localities, the backcountry of the South Atlantic states and the east bank of the Mississippi River. Spreading from these places of origin and later merging, the east and west branches of the upland short-staple cotton industry developed along similar lines until the Civil War.John Hebron Moore's The Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom in the Old Southwest: Mississippi, 1770--1860 traces the evolution of cotton culture in the region bordering the Mississippi River. Moore examines the society supported by that industry, emphasizing technological changes that transformed cotton plantations into agricultural equivalents of factories and slaves into Mule-drawn equipment led to the introduction of improved methods of managing plantation slaves, and that in turn altered the nature of plantation slavery significantly.Moore focuses on Mississippi as both the pioneer cotton state of the Old Southwest and the Old South's leading producer of cotton between 1835 and 1860. Progressive planters made major contributions ot the success of the antebellum upland cotton industry, including the breeding of superior varieties of cotton, the introduction of improved farm implements and machinery, the development of effective methods of combating soil erosion, and systems for managing slaves based upon incentives rather than coercion. In addition, unlike other studies of antebellum southern agriculture, this book examines the contributions to the success of cotton industry made by steamboats and railroads, manufacturing establishments, and the urban population.

Download or read book North American Railroads written by Brian Solomon and published by Voyageur Press. This book was released on 2014-10-15 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This richly illustrated encyclopedia of classic and contemporary American railroads features consise histories of 101 U.S. and Canadian railroads past and present. Illustrated with period and modern photography in both color and black and white, evocative print ads, and system maps, each profile is also accompanied by one or more fact boxes offering details on the railroads' geographic scope, hardware, and freight and passenger operations. Spanning more than a century and a half, this giant compendium of “fallen flags,” Class I behemoths, classic regional carriers, and transportation icons is sure to become the go-to compendium for railfans of all stripes.

Download or read book Railroads and the American People written by H. Roger Grant and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “[A] wealth of vignettes and more than 100 black-and-white illustrations . . . Does a fine job of humanizing the iron horse” (The Wall Street Journal). In this social history of the impact of railroads on American life, H. Roger Grant concentrates on the railroad’s “golden age,” from 1830 to 1930. He explores four fundamental topics—trains and travel, train stations, railroads and community life, and the legacy of railroading in America—illustrating each with carefully chosen period illustrations. Grant recalls the lasting memories left by train travel, both of luxurious Pullman cars and the grit and grind of coal-powered locals. He discusses the important role railroads played for towns and cities across America, not only for the access they provided to distant places and distant markets but also for the depots that were a focus of community life, and reviews the lasting heritage of the railroads in our culture today. This is “an engaging book of train stories” from one of railroading’s finest historians (Choice). “Highly recommended to train buffs and others in love with early railroading.” —Library Journal “With plenty of detail, Grant brings a bygone era back to life, addressing everything from social and commercial appeal, racial and gender issues, safety concerns, and leaps in technology . . . A work that can appeal to both casual and hardcore enthusiasts.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Download or read book Down and Out on the Road written by Kenneth L. Kusmer and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2001-11-29 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Covering the entire period from the colonial era to the late twentieth century, this book is the first scholarly history of the homeless in America. Drawing on sources that include records of charitable organizations, sociological studies, and numerous memoirs of formerly homeless persons, Kusmer demonstrates that the homeless have been a significant presence on the American scene for over two hundred years. He probes the history of homelessness from a variety of angles, showing why people become homeless; how charities and public authorities dealt with this social problem; and the diverse ways in which different class, ethnic, and racial groups perceived and responded to homelessness. Kusmer demonstrates that, despite the common perception of the homeless as a deviant group, they have always had much in common with the average American. Focusing on the millions who suffered downward mobility, Down and Out, On the Road provides a unique view of the evolution of American society and raises disturbing questions about the repeated failure to face and solve the problem of homelessness.

Download or read book The Old South s Modern Worlds written by L. Diane Barnes and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-04-06 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Old South has traditionally been portrayed as an insular and backward-looking society. The Old South's Modern Worlds looks beyond this myth to identify some of the many ways that antebellum southerners were enmeshed in the modernizing trends of their time. The essays gathered in this volume not only tell unexpected narratives of the Old South, they also explore the compatibility of slavery-the defining feature of antebellum southern life-with cultural and material markers of modernity such as moral reform, cities, and industry. Considered as proponents of American manifest destiny, for example, antebellum southern politicians look more like nationalists and less like separatists. Though situated within distinct communities, Southerners'-white, black, and red-participated in and responded to movements global in scope and transformative in effect. The turmoil that changes in Asian and European agriculture wrought among southern staple producers shows the interconnections between seemingly isolated southern farms and markets in distant lands. Deprovincializing the antebellum South, The Old South's Modern Worlds illuminates a diverse region both shaped by and contributing to the complex transformations of the nineteenth-century world.

Download or read book The American Transportation Revolution written by Aaron W. Marrs and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2024-04-09 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book highlights the rich social and cultural history of the transportation revolution"--

Download or read book America s Johannesburg written by Bobby M. Wilson and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2019-12-01 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In some ways, no American city symbolizes the black struggle for civil rights more than Birmingham, Alabama. During the 1950s and 1960s, Birmingham gained national and international attention as a center of activity and unrest during the civil rights movement. Racially motivated bombings of the houses of black families who moved into new neighborhoods or who were politically active during this era were so prevalent that Birmingham earned the nickname “Bombingham.” In this critical analysis of why Birmingham became such a national flashpoint, Bobby M. Wilson argues that Alabama’s path to industrialism differed significantly from that of states in the North and Midwest. True to its antebellum roots, no other industrial city in the United States depended as much on the exploitation of black labor so early in its urban development as Birmingham. A persuasive exploration of the links between Alabama’s slaveholding order and the subsequent industrialization of the state, America’s Johannesburg demonstrates that arguments based on classical economics fail to take into account the ways in which racial issues influenced the rise of industrial capitalism.

Download or read book The Birth of Big Business in the United States 1860 1914 written by David O. Whitten and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2005-11-30 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The economic and cultural roots of contemporary American business can be traced directly to developments in the era between the Civil War and World War I. The physical expansion of the country combined with development of transportation and communication infrastructures to create a free market of vast proportion and businesses capable of capitalizing on the accompanying economies of scale, through higher productivity, lower costs, and broader distribution. The Birth of Big Business in the United States illuminates the conditions that changed the face of American business and the national economy, giving rise to such titans as Standard Oil, United States Steel, American Tobacco, and Sears, Roebuck, as well as institutions such as the United States Post Office. During this period, commercial banking and law also evolved, and, as the authors argue, business and government were not antagonists but partners in creating mass consumer markets, process innovations, and regulatory frameworks to support economic growth. The Birth of Big Business in the United States is not only an incisive account of modern business development but a fascinating glimpse into a dynamic period of American history.

Download or read book Transition to an Industrial South written by Michael J. Gagnon and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 2012-10-12 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Renowned New South booster Henry Grady proposed industrialization as a basis of economic recovery for the former Confederacy. Born in 1850 in Athens, Georgia, to a family involved in the city's thriving manufacturing industries, Grady saw firsthand the potential of industrialization for the region. In Transition to an Industrial South, Michael J. Gagnon explores the creation of an industrial network in the antebellum South by focusing on the creation and expansion of cotton textile manufacture in Athens. By 1835, local entrepreneurs had built three cotton factories in Athens, started a bank, and created the Georgia Railroad. Although known best as a college town, Athens became an industrial center for Georgia in the antebellum period and maintained its stature as a factory hub even after competing cities supplanted it in the late nineteenth century. Georgia, too, remained the foremost industrial state in the South until the 1890s. Gagnon reveals the political nature of procuring manufacturing technology and building cotton mills in the South, and demonstrates the generational maturing of industrial laboring, managerial, and business classes well before the advent of the New South era. He also shows how a southern industrial society grew out of a culture of social and educational reform, economic improvements, and business interests in banking and railroading. Using Athens as a case study, Gagnon suggests that the connected networks of family, business, and financial relations provided a framework for southern industry to profit during the Civil War and served as a principal guide to prosperity in the immediate postbellum years.

Download or read book The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture written by Charles Reagan Wilson and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2014-02-01 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Providing a chronological and interpretive spine to the twenty-four volumes of The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, this volume broadly surveys history in the American South from the Paleoindian period (approximately 8000 B.C.E.) to the present. In 118 essays, contributors cover the turbulent past of the region that has witnessed frequent racial conflict, a bloody Civil War fought and lost on its soil, massive in- and out-migration, major economic transformations, and a civil rights movement that brought fundamental change to the social order. Charles Reagan Wilson's overview essay examines the evolution of southern history and the way our understanding of southern culture has unfolded over time and in response to a variety of events and social forces--not just as the opposite of the North but also in the larger context of the Atlantic World. Longer thematic essays cover major eras and events, such as early settlement, slave culture, Reconstruction, the New Deal, and the rise of the New South. Brief topical entries cover individuals--including figures from the Civil War, the civil rights movement, and twentieth-century politics--and organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Daughters of the Confederacy, and Citizens' Councils, among others. Together, these essays offer a sweeping reference to the rich history of the region.

Download or read book Extractives Manufacturing and Services written by David O. Whitten and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 1997-04-22 with total page 538 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The second volume in the Handbook of American Business History series, this book offers concise histories of extractive, manufacturing, and service industries as well as extensive bibliographic essays pointing to the leading sources on each industry and bibliographic checklists. Supplementing other bibliographic materials in business history, this volume provides researchers with a much needed path through the vast array of material available in the library and on the Internet. Indicating which resources to check and which to bypass, the book is a guide to a sometimes overwhelming amount of information. Each of the book's chapters provides a concise industry history, beginning with the industry's rise to importance in the U.S. and continuing to the present. The bibliographic essays provide a narrative outline of the leading sources published or made available in archives, libraries, or museum collections since 1971, when Lovett's American Economic and Business History Information Sources was published. Each discussion concludes with a bibliographic checklist of the titles mentioned in the essay as well as other titles. In a rapidly expanding information society, researchers, teachers, and students may be easily overwhelmed by the exhaustive material available in print and electronically. What is useful and what can be ignored is a strategic question, and few know where to begin. This book provides a guide.