The railroad originally was as completely dissociated from steam propulsion as was the ship

With the reorganization of 1898 finished, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad entered a new period in its history.

Farmers, merchants, manufacturers, and the traveling public have all had their troubles with the transportation lines, and the difficulties to which these struggles have given rise have produced that problem which is even now apparently far from solution.

People began to understand that with the acquisition of California the nation had obtained practically half a continent, of which the future possibilities were almost unlimited, so far as the development of natural resources and the genera production of wealth were concerned.

As the contest proceeded, public interest increased and the entire country watched to see which company would win the big government subsidies through the mountains.

Horses and mules, and even sail cars, made more rapid progress than did the earliest locomotive.

The public conviction that a railroad linking the West and the East was an absolute necessity became so pronounced after the gold discoveries of '49 that Congress passed an act in 1853 providing for a survey of several lines from the Mississippi to the Pacific.