Transportation By: Matthew Kikkert

Early Transportation Dirt roads began to connect major cities in the early 1700s, but conditions were very poor and dangerous. Taverns sprung up on these roads and were a symbol of American democracy. These roads were traveled by either foot or horse and wagon. The Lancaster Turnpike was completed in Pennsylvania in the 1790s. This was a successful way to make money and it stimulated western development. The War of 1812 brought an outcry for better transportation in America. Highways including the Cumberland Road improved land routes to the Ohio Valley region.

Transportation Boom of the Early 1800s Steamboats on the Ohio River, the Cumberland Road stretching from Pennsylvania, and the new Erie Canal were new ways of transportation. These routes opened westward movements to Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Robert Fulton installed the first steamboat in 1807. This doubled the travel on rivers as people could now go upstream. Erie Canal was completed in 1825 under the leadership of New York governor DeWitt Clinton. Thousands of steamships would now be able to travel the Great Lakes and this attracted European immigrants to move to the Great Lakes states. All this bound the country together tighter. The South sent cotton to the North, the West grew grain for the East, and the East made machines and textiles for the West and South.

Railroads The first railroad appeared in 1828, and in 1860 the U.S. would have over 30,000 miles of tracks with 75% of them in the rapidly industrializing North. The transcontinental railroad was built as a solution to connect new territories in the West. Gadsden Purchase bought land in New Mexico and Arizona needed to build the railroad in the South. Meanwhile construction on a transcontinental railroad in the North began. Union Pacific Railroad was commissioned by Congress to start building westward from Omaha, Nebraska. Central Pacific Railroad started building toward the east from California. Heading the construction was Leland Stanford. The two sides met in Ogden, Utah in 1869. This welded the West with the Union and facilitated trade with Asia.

Railroads (cont.) The railroad network spurred the industrialization of the post-Civil War years. Cornelius Vanderbilt and his son William Vanderbilt controlled most of the railroads in the late 1800s. Cornelius built the New York Central Station and popularized a tougher metal track. Robber Baron, William Vanderbilt, had unfair policies and was thus controlling America possibly even more than the president. The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 prohibited rebates, pools, and required railroads to publish their rates openly. This was the first attempt by Washington to regulate business in the interest of society at large.

New Invention of the Automobile Henry Ford built his first car in 1896. Henry Ford and Ransom E. Olds developed the automobile even more in the 1910s. Automobiles were made more efficient by Frederick W. Taylor who eliminated wasted motion. Henry Ford invented the assembly line to increase production. This made the car much more affordable and available to the common man. America spread out with the invention of the automobile into suburbs from the urban core. America became a nation of commuters.

Early Airplanes Orville and Wilbur Wright invented the first airplane in 1903. As the airplanes began to get off the ground, the world began to shrink. After World War 1, private companies began to operate passenger lines with airmail contracts. The first transcontinental airmail route was established from New York to San Francisco in 1920. Charles Lindbergh became the first person to fly across the Atlantic Ocean by himself with no stops.

Transportation Begins to Modernize When Dwight Eisenhower passed the Interstate Highway Act of 1956, a $27 billion plan was put in place to build 42,000 miles of highways. This bill offered benefits to the automobile, oil, and travel industries while robbing the railroads, especially passenger trains, of business. In 1957, Boeing introduced the first large passenger jet, the “707”. This was the start of yet another transportation method evolving into what it is today.