Abraham Lincoln had a vision. Being a railroad lawyer himself, and like most Americans, never actually seeing one before, he knew that with the building of a railroad it would bring many advantages to expand the industrial power of the growing nation and supply the nation with many products they had never seen before. Lincoln knew that with the building of this railroad it had many more conveyances than the canals that were built in Illinois and Michigan. Without the building of the Transcontinental Railroad there was no way to move people and products of any size from the East to West.
The Americans needed a way to connect the East and west that could make traveling faster, and that had a capacity to transport a large volume of goods across the country. The Americans depended highly on this railroad to overcome the immeasurable distance across the continent. Since the country had a continuous population growth from seventeen million in 1840 to seventy-six million by
With the continuous growth of the Industrial cities in the East, there was a great need for fresh food. Since many people living in the industrial areas didn’t have the time to grow their own food, it was very important for them to get the food from the west to help improve their health and diet.
Once the railroad across the country was completed, American technological innovation led to the ability to transport food as well as other goods. Businessmen thought of all the money they could make by having an entire continent full of customers and using the railroads to serve their needs. The railroads even partnered with companies like Wells Fargo to create the “refrigerator” rail cars that could transport huge quantities of food. This also meant that the food that once spoiled before would still be fresh when it reached eastern cities. It also meant that the food being grown in the rich soil of the agricultural land in the west was, if not better, but more fresh and faster travelin
Example Essays Home
