Early Railroads

A commercial "tramroad" was drawn in Pennsylvania in October, 1809 by John Thomson and was entitled "Draft Exhibiting . . . the Railroad as Contemplated by Thomas Leiper Esq. From His Stone Saw-Mill and Quarries on Crum Creek  to His Landing on Ridley Creek." Thomas Leiper was a wealthy Philadelphia tobacconist who owned stone quarries near Chester. Using his survey map, Thomson helped Reading Howell, the project engineer and a well-known mapmaker, construct the first practical wooden tracks for a tramroad.

Thomson was a notable land surveyor and father of the famous civil engineer (and longtime president of the Pennsylvania Railroad), John Edgar Thomson, who was also a mapmaker. In 1873, the younger Thomson donated his father's 1809 map to the Delaware County Institute of Science to substantiate the claim that the map, and Leiper's railroad, were the first such works in North America.

In 1826, a commercial tramroad was surveyed and constructed at Quincy, Massachusetts, by Gridley Bryant, with the machinery for it developed by Solomon Willard. It used horsepower to haul granite, needed for building the Bunker Hill Monument from the quarries at Quincy, four miles to the wharf on the Neponset River.

These early uses of railways gave little hint that a revolution in methods of transportation was underway. Improvements in the steam engine were adapted by John Fitch in 1787 to propel a ship on the Delaware River, and by James Rumsey in the same year on the Potomac River. Fitch, an American inventor and surveyor, had published his "Map of the Northwest" two years earlier to finance the building of a commercial steamboat. With Robert Fulton's steamboat Clermont and a boat built by John Stevens, the use of steam power for vessels became firmly established. Railroads and steam propulsion developed separately, and it was not until the one system adopted the technology of the other that railroads began to flourish. 

John Stevens is considered the father of American railroads. In 1826, Stevens demonstrated the feasibility of steam locomotion on a circular experimental track constructed on his estate in Hoboken, New Jersey - three years before George Stephenson perfected a practical steam locomotive in England. The first railroad charter in North America was granted to Stevens in 1815. Grants to others followed, and work soon began on the first operational railroads. 

Surveying, mapping, and construction started for the Baltimore and Ohio operating line in 1830, and fourteen miles of track were opened before the year ended. This line was extended in 1831 to Frederick, Maryland and, in 1832, to Point of Rocks. Until 1831, when a locomotive made in America was placed in service, the B & O relied upon horsepower. 

Following the B & O Railroad were the Mohawk and Hudson, opened in September 1830, the Saratoga, opened in July 1832, and the South Carolina Canal and Rail Road Company (whose 136 miles of track, completed to Hamburg in 1833, then constituted the longest steam railroad in the world). The Columbia Railroad of Pennsylvania, completed in 1834, and the Boston and Providence, completed in June 1835, were other early lines. Surveys for, and construction of, tracks for these and other pioneer railroads not only created a demand for special mapping but also called on mapmakers to show the progress of surveys and completed lines on general maps and on maps in "travelers guides". 

Planning and construction of railroads in the United States progressed rapidly and haphazardly, without direction or supervision from the states that granted charters to construct them. Before 1840, most surveys were made for short passenger lines which proved to be financially unprofitable. As steam-powered railroads faced stiff competition from canal companies, many partially completed lines were abandoned. It was not until the Boston and Lowell Railroad diverted traffic from the Middlesex Canal that the success of the new mode of transportation was assured. Although the industrial and commercial depression and the panic of 1837 slowed railroad construction, interest was revived with completion of the Western Railroad of Massachusetts in 1843. This line conclusively demonstrated the feasibility of transporting agricultural products and other commodities by rail for long distances at low cost. 

Early railroad surveys and construction were financed by private investors. Before the 1850 land grant to the Illinois Central Railroad, indirect federal subsidies were provided by the federal government in the form of route surveys made by army engineers. However, in the 1824 General Survey Bill to establish works of internal improvements, railroads were not specifically mentioned.

The earliest printed map in the collections of the Library of Congress, based on government surveys conducted for a state-owned railroad, is "Map of the Country Embracing the Various Routes Surveyed for the Western & Atlantic Rail Road of Georgia, 1837". The surveys were made under the direction of Lt. Col. Stephen H. Long, chief engineer, who ten years earlier had surveyed the routes for the Baltimore and Ohio. Work on the 138-mile Georgia route from Atlanta to Chattanooga started in 1841 and, by 1850, the line was open to traffic. Its strategic location made it a key supply route for the Confederacy, and it was on this line that the famous "Andrews Raid" of April, 1862 occurred when Union soldiers disguised as railroad employees captured the locomotive known as "The General".

The Transcontinental Railroad 

Chief promoter of a transcontinental railroad was Asa Whitney, a New York merchant active in the China trade who was obsessed with the idea of a railroad to the Pacific. In January, 1845, he petitioned Congress for a charter and grant of a sixty-mile strip through the public domain to help finance construction.

Whitney suggested the use of Irish and German immigrant labor, which was in great abundance at the time. Wages were to be paid in land, so that there would be settlers along the route. It was argued that these settlers would not only need a steady supply of produce but they would also become regular patrons of the completed line. The failure of Congress to act on Whitney's proposal was mainly due to the vigorous opposition of Sen. Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri, who favored a western route originating at St. Louis. 

In 1849, Whitney published a booklet to promote his scheme entitled “Project for a Railroad to the Pacific”. It was accompanied by an outline map of North America which showed the route of his railroad from Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, across the Rocky Mountains north of South Pass. An alternate route to the south of the pass joined the main line at the Salmon River and continued to Puget Sound. Proposed lines also extended from St. Louis to San Francisco and from Independence, Missouri, to New Mexico and the Arkansas River. Although Congress failed to sanction his plan, Whitney made the Pacific railroad one of the great public issues of the day. The acquisition of California following the Mexican War opened the way for other routes to the coast. The discovery of gold, the settlement of the frontier, and the success of the eastern railroads increased interest in building a railroad to the Pacific.

Under the provisions of the Army Appropriation Act of March 1853, Secretary of War Jefferson Davis was directed to survey possible routes to the Pacific. Four east to west routes, roughly following specific parallels, were surveyed by parties under the supervision of the Topographical Corps. The most northerly survey, between the 47th and 49th parallels, was under the direction of Isaac Ingalls Stevens, governor of Washington Territory. This route closely approximated that proposed by Asa Whitney.

Completion ceremony at Promontory Summit,
Utah, May 10, 1869

The Railroad Act of 1862 put government support behind the transcontinental railroad and helped create the Union Pacific Railroad, which subsequently joined with the Central Pacific at Promontory, Utah, on May 10, 1869.
Source

Early Steam Locomotives

It is said that the first locomotives used in the United States were built in England for the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company. The first locomotive to operate in the Americas was the Stourbridge Lion, one of the four original locomotives built in England at the order of John B. Jervis, chief engineer of D. & H. C.C.

The Stourbridge Lion

A Wyman's Local Post stamp of 1844

The first locomotive, built in the United States in 1830, was named the Tom Thumb. It ran on the Baltimore and Ohio (B&O) Railroad. 

The steam locomotive John Bull was made by the English firm Stephensons for the Camden and Amboy Railroad in New Jersey. It arrived as a set of parts at Philadelphia in late in August, 1831 and was assembled by Isaac Dripps. The John Bull had been purchased by New Jersey entrepreneur and engineer Robert Stevens.

The John Bull

In 1831-32, D. & H. C.C.’s Jervis had two more locomotives built in the United States, one of which was named the DeWitt Clinton.

Major Early Indiana Railroads

Lawrenceburg & Indianapolis: Chartered in 1832, but not completed until 1853. It connected central Indiana with Cincinnati and points east and competed with the Madison & Indianapolis line.

Jeffersonville Railroad: Also chartered in 1832, but delays led to subsequent re-charterings. The line from Jeffersonville to Columbus was not completed until 1852. Competition led to an intense rivalry with the Madison & Indianapolis line. After years of competition, the two lines merged in 1866.

Madison & Indianapolis train, 1850s

Bellefontaine & Indianapolis: The second rail line out of Indianapolis, it was begun in 1848. By 1852, the line ran to Union City on the state line and connected Indianapolis to the east and northeast.

Peru & Indianapolis: It was an important northern line, built with the intention of connecting Indianapolis with the Wabash & Erie Canal. It reached Noblesville in 1851, and was completed to Peru three years later.

Terre Haute & Indianapolis: This line was originally intended to connect to Richmond and bisect Indiana following the route of the National Road. Funding problems caused it to stop at Indianapolis.

Indiana Central: It ran from Indianapolis to Richmond. Begun in 1851, it was completed in 1853, essentially making the Terre Haute to Richmond plan a reality. It paralleled the National Road and did much to diminish traffic on that great thoroughfare.

Indianapolis & Lafayette: This line completed the original idea of the 1836 internal improvements act to connect Madison and Lafayette. Completed in 1852, it helped supply a connection between the Ohio River and Chicago.

Ohio & Mississippi Railroad: Reaching across the southern part of Indiana from Cincinnati to Vincennes, this line allowed connections from Baltimore to St. Louis. When completed in 1857, it was the longest continuous rail route in the world.

"Express" train, 1850s

New Albany & Salem: This line (later the Monon) was the longest railroad in the state of Indiana prior to the Civil War. By eventually reaching Michigan City, it connected the Ohio River to Lake Michigan, and eventually Chicago.

Railroad advertisement, 1942