How did people react to the first train?

When the first steam train was built in 1804, people were worried that the speed would make rail passengers unable to breathe or that they would be shaken unconscious by the vibrations. But by the 1850s, passengers were traveling at previously unthinkable speeds of 50mph (80km/h) or more.



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Trains kicked off a massive change in the way that we do things as a civilization, and they continue to evolve as technology develops. Before trains, it took months to cross a country. When they were introduced, it took days. Goods could be transported across states quicker than ever before.

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The railroad opened the way for the settlement of the West, provided new economic opportunities, stimulated the development of town and communities, and generally tied the country together.

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For immigrants to the United States, the Transcontinental Railroad presented an opportunity to seek their fortunes in the West. There, they found more opportunity than the port cities of the East Coast, where discrimination kept immigrants living in urban squalor.

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1814 - George Stephenson constructs his first locomotive, Blücher for the Killingworth wagonway. The locomotive was modelled on Matthew Murray's. It could haul 30 tons of coal up a hill at 4 mph (6.4 km/h) but was too heavy to run on wooden rails or iron rails which existed at that time.

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Trains have been a popular form of transportation since the 19th century. When the first steam train was built in 1804, people were worried that the speed would make rail passengers unable to breathe or that they would be shaken unconscious by the vibrations.

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Over 200 years ago, when locomotives were first being developed, people worried their speed would make passengers “unable to breath” or that “they would be shaken unconscious by the vibrations.”

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The railways, together with the positive influence on the economic development of the regions in which they were built, have caused irreparable damage to the environment. They destroyed natural landscapes, led to the death and reduction of wildlife populations, polluted the air and created an unbearable noise.

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Passenger train travel in the 1880s generally cost 2-3 cents per mile. Transcontinental (New York to San Francisco) ticket rates as of June 1870 were $136 for first class in a Pullman sleeping car; $110 for second class; $65 for third or “emigrant” class seats on a bench.

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Railroad expansion led to labor reform while facilitating migration around the country. Bicycles empowered women's rights advocates and encouraged female independence. Buses became sites of civil rights activism. Transportation is inextricably linked to the spread of social change throughout the nation and beyond.

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The rails carried more than goods; they provided a conduit for ideas, a pathway for discourse. With the completion of its great railroad, America gave birth to a transcontinental culture. And the route further engendered another profound change in the American mind.

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By 1900, much of the nation's railroad system was in place. The railroad opened the way for the settlement of the West, provided new economic opportunities, stimulated the development of town and communities, and generally tied the country together.

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