While no one railroad can completely duplicate another line, two or more may compete at particular points

The construction of extensive railways, however, and particularly the consolidation of small, experimental lines into large systems, dates from the days of the discovery of gold in California

The history of the Erie Railroad ever since 1901 has been a record of progress

Great men are usually the products of their times and one of the men developed by these times takes rank with the greatest railroad leaders in history.

The States which form the northern border of the United States westward from the Great Lakes to the Pacific coast include an area several times larger than France and could contain ten Englands and still have room to spare.

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.

In the decade before the Civil War various north and south lines of railway were projected and some of these were assisted by grants of land from the Federal Government