Incidents Along the RailroadTwice, Native Americans sabotaged the iron rails themselves. In August 1867 a Cheyenne raiding party decided they would attempt to derail a train.
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The southern routes were objectionable to northern politicians and the northern routes were objectionable to the southern politicians, but the surveys could not, of course, resolve these sectional issues.
For others, however, the Transcontinental Railroad undermined the sovereignty of Native nations and threatened to destroy Indigenous communities and their cultures as the railroad expanded into territories inhabited by Native Americans.
Although the first railroads were successful, attempts to finance new ones originally failed as opposition was mounted by turnpike operators, canal companies, stagecoach companies and those who drove wagons. Opposition was mounted, in many cases, by tavern owners and innkeepers whose businesses were threatened.
In the United States, the most famous railroad monopoly was launched by Cornelius Vanderbilt, an early investor in railroads and water transportation. Starting with a single boat, the Vanderbilts eventually controlled an enormous empire of shipping and railway routes.
Broad support began to emerge for building a transcontinental railroad. The problem was where to place it - and in particular where to locate the eastern terminus. Northerners favored Chicago, the rapidly growing capital of free states of the Northwest.
Good and badThe railroad is credited, for instance, with helping to open the West to migration and with expanding the American economy. It is blamed for the near eradication of the Native Americans of the Great Plains, the decimation of the buffalo and the exploitation of Chinese railroad workers.
“Almost 160 years ago, our transcontinental railroad was built with the ingenuity and hard work of diverse laborers. In the West, it was the Chinese track gangs. In the Midwest, it was the civil war veterans, including African Americans, as well as Irish immigrants.
African Americans were employed as train porters, freight handlers, switch tenders, and engine shop workers. Following the Civil War, George Pullman established the Pullman Sleeping Car Company.
Initially, Chinese employees received wages of $27 and then $30 a month, minus the cost of food and board. In contrast, Irishmen were paid $35 per month, with board provided. Workers lived in canvas camps alongside the grade.
Answer and Explanation: The entire United States benefited financially from the joining of two railroads to form one transcontinental railroad. However, two industries benefited the most from the Transcontinental Railroad. Those were cotton and cattle.
For others, however, the Transcontinental Railroad undermined the sovereignty of Native nations and threatened to destroy Indigenous communities and their cultures as the railroad expanded into territories inhabited by Native Americans.
“At its peak, the English East India Company was by far the largest corporation of its kind,” says Emily Erikson, a sociology professor at Yale University, Director of the Fox International Fellowship, and author of Between Monopoly and Free Trade: The English East India Company.