An extraordinarily rich collection of photos, stereographs, engravings, maps, and documents. Many 19th century accounts of building and traveling on the railroad, plus travel guides and government documents.

Ride the rails in the late 19th century by following these travel guides for railroads across the country. Find copies of the guides showing time tables, maps, and descriptions of the trips.

A biography of Granville T. Woods, who used his knowledge of machinery to establish his own company and invent many different improvements for the railroad.

Contains a series of letters published in May and June, 1869, in the "New York Tribune" written by Albert D. Richardson, one of the first people to travel on the transcontinental railroad from coast to coast.

A brief look at the Underground Railroad and how it operated. Find some of the code words used to help runaway slaves find their way, and read about some of the "conductors" who led slaves along the routes to the North.

This map reveals the way ownership of the Union Pacific concentrated in New England and New York. It also shows how the West got a federally financed railroad, and the east got the insider networks which controlled it.

In April of 1999, Representative John T. Doolittle delivered a speech before the United States House of Representatives commemorating the contribution of Chinese-Americans to the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. This site...

In-depth look at the ceremony at Promontory Point upon the completion of the transcontinental railroad. The author discusses the preparation for the ceremony, the use of four ceremonial spikes, and what became of them. From an article in...

Read about how the Railroad Strike of 1877 was a first in many ways in labor history. This article sets up the reasons for the strike and the mixed results.

Encyclopedia Britannica provides a biography of Harriet Tubman (1820-1913), an escaped slave from Maryland who later became one of the Underground Railroad's most famous "Conductors."

Are we right to remember General Sherman as the villain of the Civil War? Read another view of the famous march to the sea.

The Underground Railroad of the 1800's inspired talented writers of all ages. This lesson plan will integrate some of these famous writings to encourage students to develop their questioning techniques for analysis of literature while...

Discusses the conflict with Mexican American and Chinese groups as white settlers pushed westward in the nineteenth century. Explains what brought so many Chinese immigrants to America and the roadblocks and discrimination that they had...

This is a brief history of a railway that was envisioned to be a "trans-prairie " railway and was planned to serve the settlers in the Red Deer area. Included are maps, and primary source documents.

These remarkable feats of design and construction transformed the ways that people travel, communicate and live. For thousands of years, mankind has engineered remarkable structures such as the pyramids of Egypt and the Great Wall of...

This site covers both the initial Industrial Revolution in the United States in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and the second revolution that highlighted new inventions and the businessmen who financed industry. Read brief...

April 1865 was a momentous month in American history. On April 9, the Confederate army under Robert E. Lee surrendered to the Union forces of Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the Civil War. Then on April 14, the victorious President...

This site examines the history of the Milwaukee Road (Railroad). This site discusses cost, number of trains, routes, expansion through the Midwest.

A good summary of the history of the building of first transcontinental railroad and images of the transcontinental railroad. From the introduction to the PBS video, The Iron Road.

The early years of Hawaii were very different from the way it is today. A man with a broken leg was the founder of the railroad that changed Hawaii's growth.

This University of Virginia Library site provides the full text of Charles Dudley Warner's 1896 essay on Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin". It includes the history of the secession crisis.

The Royal British Columbia Museum discusses the role that Italians played in shaping the province. Italian workers were instrumental with the gold rush, with coal mines and with the construction of the railroad. The Italian Community...

Contains excerpts from Albert D. Richarson's "Beyond the Mississippi" about the construction of the Central Pacific Railroad and his trip on the train.

Provides a historical overview of the Union Pacific Railroad under the following sections: building a road, financing, construction, and post-construction.