From the River to the Sea: The Untold Story of the Railroad War That Made the West

by John Sedgwick

“Riveting...A great read, full of colorful characters and outrageous confrontations back when the west was still wild.” —George R.R. Martin

A propulsive and panoramic history of one of the most dramatic stories never told—the greatest railroad war of all time, fought by the daring leaders of the Santa Fe and the Rio Grande to seize, control, and create the American West.

It is difficult to imagine now, but for all its gorgeous scenery, the American West might have been barren tundra as far as most Americans knew well into the 19th century. While the West was advertised as a paradise on earth to citizens in the East and Midwest, many believed the journey too hazardous to be worthwhile—until 1869, when the first transcontinental railroad changed the face of transportation.

Railroad companies soon became the rulers of western expansion, choosing routes, creating brand-new railroad towns, and building up remote settlements like Santa Fe, Albuquerque, San Diego, and El Paso into proper cities. But thinning federal grants left the routes incomplete, an opportunity that two brash new railroad men, armed with private investments and determination to build an empire across the Southwest clear to the Pacific, soon seized, leading to the greatest railroad war in American history.

In From the River to the Sea , bestselling author John Sedgwick recounts, in vivid and thrilling detail, the decade-long fight between General William J. Palmer, the Civil War hero leading the “little family” of his Rio Grande, and William Barstow Strong, the hard-nosed manager of the corporate-minded Santa Fe. What begins as an accidental rivalry when the two lines cross in Colorado soon evolves into an all-out battle as each man tries to outdo the other—claiming exclusive routes through mountains, narrow passes, and the richest silver mines in the world; enlisting private armies to protect their land and lawyers to find loopholes; dispatching spies to gain information; and even using the power of the press and incurring the wrath of the God-like Robber Baron Jay Gould—to emerge victorious. By the end of the century, one man will fade into anonymity and disgrace. The other will achieve unparalleled success—and in the process, transform a sleepy backwater of thirty thousand called “Los Angeles” into a booming metropolis that will forever change the United States.

Filled with colorful characters and high drama, told at the speed of a locomotive, From the River to the Sea is an unforgettable piece of American history “that seems to demand a big-screen treatment” ( The New Yorker ).

Genres: History, Nonfiction, American History, Railways, Biography, Westerns, Audiobook

352 pages, Hardcover

Published June 1, 2021

Reviews

[Lorna · Rating 4 out of 5]

From the River to the Sea: The Untold Story of the Railroad War That Made the West was a riveting piece of history that met all of my criteria. I love history of the American West, particularly that of Colorado, New Mexico and California. And trains, I have loved trains from the time as a small child as I sat with my grandfather on many an enchanting afternoon enjoying an ice cream cone at the train depot in Canon City, Colorado as he regaled me with his stories of working for the railroad.

This book takes place in the late nineteenth-century during the height of the gilded age where the author, John Sedgwick, focuses on the rivalry between two railroad companies, namely General William J. Palmer, the Civil War hero falling in love with the majesty of Colorado Springs and the beautiful and breathtaking Pikes Peak and the Rocky Mountains as he sought to expand his Rio Grande railroad. And then there was his nemisis, William Barstow Strong, the corporate-minded opponent venturing west from Kansas. Their rivalry would continue for a decade as each one tried to outdo the other.

"The force behind their railroad war wasn't just blind rage but the targeted version, a jealous hatred that threatened to destroy these two men, and their railroads, too. Strong and the General were like two moral enemies grappling on the edge of a cliff, each with his hands tight around the throat of the other. Neither could let go, but neither could finish off the other, and both were in danger of toppling into the abyss. And no higher authority could get them to stop, for there was no higher authority. Not the public, not the courts, not the government, not the law."

This is a riveting piece of history that unfolds at the speed of a locomotive making its way west, whether it be on narrow gauge tracks or not as they make their way over the Raton Pass, the Royal Gorge and on to California. What a wonderful book if you love history, Colorado, New Mexico and California, and of course railroads. To this day I am always open to another adventure on the rails. Now I am looking at a trip through the Royal Gorge before the seasons change.

[Jeanette · Rating 2 out of 5]

For others it could easily be a 4 star read. For me it was a 2.5 star read and I found myself not returning to it easily. And speed reading entire sections. Just too much of a slog with 100's of name drop or association to economic class or condition side stories. Palmer and Strong were of their time. Entirely. And their mores as well for winning competition in dubious avenues or straight out effort. Both. And the settling of those areas of the USA (today) North American continental areas were pivotal to so much of the living quality or innovation progresses for tech and life context longevities of the centuries that follow.

But- the telling was so long and rather tedious. Photos and maps saved me from not finishing. The writing never flowed for me to follow an "alive" set of eyes or did the people become flesh and blood real in print.

What has always intrigued me the most is that they truly did not know what those territories or geographic vast distances would contain. Nor did the great majority of people who moved 100's, if not 1000's of miles with SO little knowledge of the parsing of places or conditions that they would meet, have more than some hearsay clues to nature or physicality. Intrepid and also far, far more dangerous than is presupposed today. Or ever at all consistently equivocated as a positive value either. Which it absolutely was.

[Ben Denison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a interesting book.

This book discussed the development and progress of the building of the railroads across North America. From the Politics, to the vast ego's of the men in charge, the robber-barons investing, to the power hungry owners it was a fascinating recounting of a few specific areas.

The first half of the book really focus on the Colorado/New Mexico railroad wars between the Rio Grande and the Santa Fe. The legal maneuvering, the literal footraces to get prime land to build on, to the force and intimidation used on rivals. It was wild ride. I personally liked this first half because the area of contention is where my family vacations every year (Southwest Colorado) including Raton Pass, Pueblo, Canyon City, all the way up to Buena Vista and Leadville. We travel right next to these rails built so many years ago in those river canyons.

The second half of the book centered more on California and the railroad wars there between Southern Pacific and Santa Fe, and the other various offshoots trying to gain a foothold in the monopolized State.

All through the book you see how the Railroad companies and the distribution method of rail impacted how our cities were constructed, designed (Streets vs Avenues and right angles, developed (respectable side vs "Across the Tracks"). First Restaurant Chains (Harvey House), Hotel Chains, Nationalized Products/Brands like Beer (Budweiser), Cereal (Kellogg's), soft Drinks (Coke). etc. How houses were pre-fab'd in Chicago and shipped via the rail to these new cities. How current time changed as towns needed to be all on the same time, "Railroad Time" so that noon was the same in various cities. The California rail wars and the power of the Railroad companies determined where cities would be built, which cities grew and which ones didn't (they could literally turn off the tap to cities that didn't pay up, or play ball.)

I like this book. I thought the author did a great job with the story telling.

[Lois · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty tough slog if you start to agree, as even the author admitted on page 170, that this whole competition was "childish to begin with...long since..a total embarrassment for all concerned." Railroad tycoons and the race to lay track to Los Angeles. Of course, everyone is much more familiar with the Promontory Utah golden spike race. This is the much more obscure and convoluted tale of two men, two railroads, and the endless disputes, violence, legal maneuvering, big money from Boston, etc. as they schemed to outrun each other going South to go West to converge in California. Pity the women and children and colleagues and subordinates and Native Americans and Mexicans in their path.

[Hal Brodsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

As recommended in the New Yorker, this is a nonfiction account of the competition between the Santafe and Rio Grande Railroads in the 1870s and 1880s to open the southwest and southern California.
An engaging read, it focuses on the personalities and lives of the 2 railroads' presidents and their relentless competition and animosity.
What I found shocking is the fact that many Western towns that are now huge,, ugly, traffic-ridden, cumbersome, and contain districts you do not want to enter after dark were literally nonexistent before the coming of the railroad. I'm talking about you Colorado Springs (and Bastow).
Los Angeles had <10,000 people and dirt streets when the SantaFe reached it in 1890. Hollywood did not exist and Pasadena had 2 farms. Think about what you were doing in 1990, and the changes in the 100 years leading up to that year. It is frightening to think about 2090. Indeed, when I drove North from Colorado Springs to Denver in 2018, I was never out of sight of tall buildings and that was a major change from my trip on that same highway in 2011.

After all we read histories to learn how we arrived here and to predict where we might be heading.

BTW, I'm also now eager for a long train trip and a visit to Dodge City

[Katie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is just.....not good? 😅 It skips back and forth so much I struggled to follow timelines. Also the entire drama of the railroad war was....speculation? The author told us there was little to no historical stories or papers from one of the characters and yet we are told he was furious or elated or triumphant? Another favorite speculation was that because Palmer had no letters for a period of time, he was probably gay. There were absolutely gay people in this time and I'm not saying it wasn't possible but how is this at all proof of his sexuality? Furthermore, when I have tried to find more info on this whole situation it just....doesn't exist? I can find a lot about Palmer founding Colorado Springs. I can find that the two railroads both wanted the Royal Gorge. But I don't see anything in the depth and scope of the alleged rivalry in this book.

Not saying it never happened, and not saying that it wasn't possible, but I'm calling BS on this entire book

[Anne Morgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I ended up being kind of disappointed in this book. There were so many long side stories and tangents that I often lost track of the main story and why the individuals/places we were getting a side story on were important to the main storyline. The two railroad men, Palmer and Strong, spent their time trying to outdo each other, and race for the best routes - often with extremes like building stone forts along the routes and hiring armed posses to keep the other side from working. Their irrational behavior is so identical there are times when it is easy to confuse the two railroads and Sedgwick regularly lets readers know he agrees the men are being identically ridiculous. While bringing railroads west, through Colorado and eventually to California created fascinating changes to the country that I enjoyed reading about, overall I found this book too much of a slog to get through to really enthusiastically recommend to anyone.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed! Would recommend to anyone interested in history of Colorado, of railroads, or America's gilded age.

[JL Salty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: pg
Recommend: mid to late 1800s American history.

Sedgwick does a great job of jumping from person to person, sometimes timelines, to keep the reader engaged. I really enjoyed this book. Recommend especially to Colorado springs residents, as it focuses on general Palmer’s life and activities pretty heavily.

[Michael Centuori · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was a good read overall. Can be somewhat dry at times but it’s a nonfictional history book. If you love trains and history this one’s for you buddy.

[Rob Smith, Jr. · Rating 3 out of 5]

The effort is obvious, but the editor ignored the need to take the whole and create a series of it all. There is just too much here to shove into one volume. The writer dodges this by constructing as many switchbacks as the train makers he writes of.

The writers politics scream through the early chapter as he decries the Quaker background of one of his subjects. Then tacks a purpose to the same subject for joining the civil war, again, demeaning his faith. But his being a spy infiltrating the Confederates and escape from a Confederate prison made him a "hero". Nothing is given to back this up, except a writing style that the writer wanted the subject to be of the writer's thinking. Later there is mentioned "gentler characteristics" that could be attributed to his Quaker upbringing, instead stated without attribution.

Writes of capitalism with distate and that, one of his central figures, Palmer was doing it for the community and not capitalism. Of course, none of the idea of Palmer's altruism is connected to the very central core of being a Quaker. Then Sedgwick procedes to point out how much Palmer planned to expand his train into Mexico and California and the world....which would make Palmer more of a capitalistic than the other figure.

Sedgwick adds far too much editorial adjectives and asides revealing his political view and his effort to make the reader see that view, instead of a straight, factually based writing.

AS the book plows on this vast subject, the writer sheds the political views to get into the shenanigans the two antagonists are maneuvering for success of their different goals. The author does a fine job here laying out this rather complicated story. I do believe this book should have been cut into separate portions. The author is piling a ton in and indicates knowing more. If the editing had been better, none of that should have been obvious. Nonetheless, if the writer has that much information, why not create one volume of one and another for the other? Possibly a third to string it all together. There are a few others included the author provides extensive narrative of. Would love to read a separate book where so much information would create a fascinating tale.

Passing the politics, that appear again a few times, and the clunky length begging for more space, this is an enlightening book taking in more than other books have covering this story.
Per chance, i picked up a fictional western book by the William Johnstone group that covers this same territory in 250-odd pages and, though fictional & melodramatic, does a better job getting the story across than this does.

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 6 out of 10 points.

Note: I got to read an advanced version of this book via NetGalley.com. The fianl version published could be different.

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would actually give this a 4.25 perhaps. It is a good overview of the history of the Denver & Rio Grande and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroads. It covers primarily their confrontations in New Mexico and Colorado, where both railroads were attempting to get thru the same pass in each state, with the same goal of eventually reaching the Pacific. It covers the main characters involved as well as the political, economic and historical backgrounds at the time. Many of the books listed in his research are ones I have in my personal library, so I am encouraged to do more reading. This a a great book for a railroad and history enthusiast. It will wet your appetite to delve deeper into the stories and backgrounds of these railroads and of the West. An enjoyable read.

[Ethan Sexton · Rating 3 out of 5]

While the history this book covers is certainly fascinating, and the case made for its significance is convincing, it has structural faults. It starts strong and ends strong, but the path to connect those dots is rambling in a way that doesn’t feel properly connected with the main narratives. Additionally, many of the figures introduced are not given enough time to feel like more than a distraction, which, given the events, were certainly not. Still, it’s a fine history book that even manages to slip in a bit about Wyatt Earp, which is always a plus from me.

[James McGlynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating railroad history emanating from Colorado Springs between General William Palmer and William Strong. Palmer had his Glen Eyrie at the Garden of the Gods for his wife Queen who left him. Jay Gould appears to take over in the end. Crazy times for these men deciding how the country will settle. Now watching 'Hell on Wheels" series about the railroads and visiting Colorado Springs shortly.
The 3 stars is since I had a hard time keeping track of the different rails and characters.

[Peg - The History Shelf · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can read my review at Shelf Awareness here:
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/reade...

[L.A. Heberlein]

If I had read more history of Los Angeles, which I solemnly vow to do, I would have understood that Los Angeles is a railroad town. Like so many other towns in the American West. When the railroad arrived in Los Angeles in 1887, it “unleashed a torrent of newcomers like nothing America had ever seen, or ever would see again.” The railroad “brought in 300,000 people just over the first six months, ten times the city’s resident population. . . by 1890, the L.A. population had shot up to over 150,000, more than five times what it had been five years before . . . the biggest surge in population of any city in the history of the United States.”

The railroad is the Santa Fe, and this book is the story of its visionary, William Barstow Strong, who saw in a short stretch of track in Kansas the possibility of the Pacific. It’s told as a tale of fierce competition between Strong and William Jackson Palmer, the equally driven father of the Rio Grande, each of the two driven mad by the thought that the other would get somewhere first. At points engaging bands of riflemen to contest for the rights to lay track. (Their competition climaxes in a paroxysm of folly as they strive to reach the Pacific via Mexico.)

There’s plenty a tale of the frontier along the way, and Sedgwick tells them engagingly. (Even if some of them are so distantly connected to the plot as to seem gratuitous. Do we need one more telling of Baby Doe Tabor’s story? In a book about railroads?)

Sedgwick’s acknowledgments offer effusive praise to his editor, but the book doesn’t seem to have had one. Consider this sentence from p. 244:

When some of the board members turned on him, Willie Bell and a few other Palmer loyalists grew indignant that anyone question the heroic founder’s leadership?

What’s that question mark doing there? I’ve certainly made many such a sloppy error. But that’s what editors are supposed to be for.

I was interested in the book primarily because so much of it is about Colorado. Sedgwick reveals in his acknowledgments that his acquaintance with Colorado consists of little more than one trip down I-25 in a rental car. That shows throughout. He calls the San Luis Valley the San Juan Valley. (Check the index. There is it, San Juan Valley, pp. 70-72.) For some odd reason, he habitually refers to Raton Pass as the Raton Pass. (Why not the Pike’s Peak?)

His oddest verbal tick is calling railroads “trains.” A train is a collection of cars, pulled or less often pushed by a locomotive, and formerly terminated by a caboose. A railroad is all the infrastructure on which the train runs, including rails, ties, bridges, and the corporate might behind it, the workers, the management, the capital. I don’t know whether Sedgwick thinks he’s being cute by calling a railroad a train, but about the twentieth time he did I wanted to find him and shake him.

[Bruce Cline · Rating 4 out of 5]

From the River to the Sea: The Untold Story of the Railroad War That Made the West, by John Sedgwick (2021, 294pp). This book is largely the story of two men, General William J. Palmer and William Barstow Strong, and their fierce competitions to build railways in the American Southwest. Their two railroads, the Rio Grande and the Santa Fe respectively, helped develop or even create towns and cities from Colorado Springs to Denver to Santa Fe to Los Angeles. This is primarily the story of the business lives of the two railroad magnates and their railroad empires, and includes what is known of their private lives, railroad expansion more broadly, the westward growth of the nation, and many related details. Of possible interest to southwest readers, there is considerable detail about competition for access to Raton Pass, Pueblo/Canon City/Royal Gorge, and New Mexico and southern California. Additionally, there is interesting information at the intersection of railroads and: precious metal discoveries in the mountains of Colorado; Fred Harvey and Company; the waxing and waning of silver prices and the effect on the U.S. economy; the brutal business environment of the times; and other fascinating details of the mid to late 19th century. This is a good book, but I take issue with a number of mostly incidental historical facts or assertions made by the author. They’re not worth detailing, but they made me wonder about the accuracy of other things he wrote. But no matter, this is an interesting read, especially because of my familiarity with much of the landscape and some of the history about which he wrote.

[Richard Jespers · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you’ve ever driven on an Interstate highway in the western United States—at posted speeds of 80 mph or faster, and people do zoom faster—it can seem as if you’re passing through a Disneyland sort of panorama. Mountains. Red arches. The occasional evergreen—with your AC cranked down low. In John Sedgwick’s book, however, one learns what it was like to traverse that terrain as a railroad worker, including the builders themselves. He traces the lives and work of two men—Strong building the Santa Fe and Palmer, the Rio Grande—who make “river to the sea” travel possible beginning in the late 1880s. This journey includes side trips by way of chapters like one devoted to the beloved Harvey House hotels, the first chain of its kind to provide bed, beverage, and breakfast along the way. Always, however, Sedgwick returns to the struggle these two men mount against the elements, terrain, and government (state and federal) but mostly against each other, to open up the West to the established civilization in the East. It is quite a ride, and Sedgwick ensures that you do not miss a minute of it.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this a great book, highlighting a little known, but fascinating snippet of US (and Mexican) history. It is likely to appeal to the engineering and construction minds out there (like myself), but it is also a great human story of the two mini-barons. Brings to mind Walter White whose goal was "not meth or money, but empire"; i.e., the character types are still with us. It was all about besting the other guy, often going to ridiculous, and ruinous lengths (albeit in large part other peoples money; a lot of rich aristocrats in England then it seems). At the same time, it facilitated things like the chain restaurant and hotels (Harvey houses) as an unplanned side show. In the long run, the west and all of us were the beneficiaries. I also do genealogy and several ancestors were impacted by this "war" (e.g., prospectors riding the new rails from St Louis to Colorado and farmers taking from Tenn to Kansas); I understand those people better now. Fortunately, the author does not attempt a history of rail and keeps the reading moving along and of reasonably length.

[Sarah Bodaly · Rating 4 out of 5]

The railroads were what made the West, and it was a fast-paced race to be the first company to push forward in the vast frontier, dropping new towns in the vast openness, and creating new chapters in history. Of the hundreds of small rail companies in the States in the mid 1800s, two competed the most for the race West – The Rio Grand and the Santa Fe. There were some shady dealings, accusations, backhanded transactions, and all sorts of fun stuff. *cough cough* At times, the gorges were only wide enough for one track, so the two lines would share… one rail. And since they were different gauges, then they would each have one other rail to accommodate the width of their train. This was a workable solution when you knew precisely what times the trains were passing through the gorges. It would be harrowing if the times were not clearly articulated, so this was a horrific crash just waiting to happen. All in all, decently interesting, but the persistent name-dropping bogged the story down a bit.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

DRAMA: It's 2 a. m. and a pickax strikes its first blow into Raton Pass icy ground. Santa Fe here we come! WARFARE: Two railroad builders with first name William, Palmer of the Rio Grande and Strong of the Santa Fe, face off. Who can first enter the Royal Gorge? INTRIGUE: Secret plans to do the other in. Many other Western barons and tycoons permeate the book, including Collis Huntington of California's Central Pacific, “Haw” Warner of silver-rich Leadville, Colo. Then there's Jay Gould, the eastern railroad magnate. For the cross-country railroad builders, the sea (Pacific Ocean) was the goal. Achieving it often necessitated a grand figurative chess game. I loved reading this is a popular history book in the tradition of David McCullough's works.

[Peggy Page · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent, fast-moving account of the rivalry between two railroad barons of the very wild West. I was especially struck, once again, how truly wild and lawless the West was in the period after the civil war, when people and enterprises rushed in with few institutions to restrain the chaos - or the greed. Rival rail companies scrambled to lay claim to the best routes by laying track before they had the legal right to do so, and defended their projects with private armies and bribes. I found some of the descriptions of the legal wrangles between the railroads tedious, but enjoyed the portraits of Queen Palmer and Baby Doe Tabor immensely. Also enjoyed the brief history of the meteoric rise of Los Angeles after the arrival of the railroad.

[Jay Maher · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading about how our railroad companies built the American West. The book gave excellent facts about the politics, and the individual company wars that took place to build the railroad systems. It provided some great insights on the personal lives of some of the key stakeholders in these companies. I also enjoyed reading about the strategies involved, and how towns were created throughout the West as the railroad expansion continued towards its ultimate goal of Los Angeles. Los Angeles and so many other towns were developed solely because of the railroad systems.
I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys historical nonfiction books around about America and how our country was built.

[Monte Lamb · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good story about how the Denver and Rio Grande railroad and the Santa Fe railroad fought to stretch their line from Colorado to the west coast. It focuses on the two main men involved as president of each company. The author does a good job showing how wild and unregulated the times were in the 1880's while the railroad companies were expanding into the west. The book comes up a little short when it digresses into too many unrelated areas. I really didn't see a need for the final sections on how California grew after the lines reached Southern California. However, I did enjoy it and learned a lot from it.

[Shawn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disappointing.
The numerous typos were annoying, but the anti-Native American tropes and tall tales early in the book were uncalled for. Found a few geography errors too, which then makes you doubt other parts of the story. Parts of the history are very interesting, but the timeline switchbacks make it hard to follow sometimes. But when the author tried to compare the railroad barons with the founders of Google, Apple, etc I really lost it. Make the leap to airliners or Route 66 and the interstate highway system, but computes and the internet were a weird way to end the book.
Poor endnotes too, which made further research and fact-checking impossible.

[Charles Bookman · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the story of how two railroad men General William Palmer and William Barstow Strong battled for decades to open the southwest. Albuquerque, Phoenix and Los Angeles—all were little more than dusty way stations before the railroads reached them. The gilded age railroad titans were the Jobs and Musks of their day—visionaries, engineers and hard-driving entrepreneurs. This book will interest railroad history buffs and those interested in the history of the southwest. Read more at bookmanreader.blogspot.com .

[Rob McMonigal · Rating 3 out of 5]

As with everyone else with a similar rating, this book had some amazing content but more branch lines than the Pennsylvania Railroad. There's helping with context and there's veering off into character histories of people who were only bit players. I would have enjoyed this a lot about 1/3 of the size of what it was. Even the ending--a rant about Amazon as the new railroad--was a large tangent. I love trains and the history of rail, so I'm the target audience. And I felt this missed the mark enough to just think of it as average.

[Frank · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting story on the construction of the railroad systems throughout the United States that helped shape the opening of the American West during the 1800's. The competition between the builders of the railroads, the difficulties that were encountered along the way and the tenacity of these builders to overcome every hurdle including the politics, price cutting, misuse of the press and the greed make for an interesting and very well documented read. When the Railroad Wars were going full blast in 1887, you could buy a ticket from Chicago to Los Angeles for just $1.00. Imagine!

[Bruce Whitmore · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting. I was unaware of the battles over/over nor the intricacies of the development of the railroads of the western United States. Previously, I was unaware of the ceding of lands by the government to the railroads that they used to develop revenue for construction of the railways and the towns and cities to support their needs.

Lots of details in this book. Also looks into the private lives of the two major trainmen and the effect s that their work had won themselves and their families.

[Sara Zarr]

This isn't the most amazingly-written nonfiction, but it's more than adequate in telling this interesting piece of history and laying out the influence of the 19th century railroad tycoons. Also just one example of how a small number of people accumulated VAST amounts of wealth through the government-enabled displacement of native people and exploitation of labor. The author doesn't really shine a light on that, but in the telling of the story it's all there.

A nice companion to Prairie Fires, which touches on some of this stuff but isn't really about it.