Thanks for that information Mac. That confirms my contention that the land grants were not “free money.” but what do you mean by “baises”?
Also remember about that “free money”:
Railroads that got land from the federal government paid for it in the form of free and (later) reduced transportation for mail, troops and materials. About 1947 Congress passed a resolution declaring these railroads “paid up.”
Also, lands retained by Washington became much more valuable and sold for a higher price because of railroad access. A good deal for everybody.
And Mac is so right that the railroads had to dig deep for their own money in order to build and qualify for the retroactive government help. The various recent histories of the original transcon describe how the UP’s Ames brothers and the CP’s Big Four, particularly Huntington, risked their fortunes to float construction thru incredible difficulties. They had more guts than a slaughterhouse.
I guess what I’m saying, is that it’s hard to get an accurate ubderstanding sometimes, of events from the past, when so many writers are willing to re-write history in order to support their contemporary agendas- whatever they may be.
Mac- Thanks once agian, for a history lesson.
Mac,
I think you ought to (need to?) write a book.
To really understand James J Hill, get and read the book by Michael P. Malone. He tells how in building the GN, Hill also built branches both north and south of the main to bring materials to the new settlers AND bring their “crops” to markets. This in great contrast to the NP that was built without these branches - built only to get to the Pacific Coast. Hill also understood good track-building and elevated his tracks above the prairie so that the wind would blow the snow off of the tracks. Malone also tells of Hill doing ‘creative accounting’ to hide profits in the early 1900’s. The title of the biography is: James J Hill, Empire Builder of the Northwest. Hill’s son Louis was a major promoter of Glacier National Park and the use on boxcars of the mountain goat and the lettering “See America First”. This was an effort to get wealthy americans to go west instead of going to europe and, of course, stay in the lodges they built in the park. Glacier is the only National Park that has a main line railroad all along the southern border.
A better biography of Hill is Albro Martin’s James J. Hill and the Opening of the Northwest. Also very good and closely related is The Man Who Found the Money John Stewart Kennedy and the Financing of the Western Railroads by Saul Englebourg. Kennedy was a key player in the St Paul purchase and remained an strong partner with Hill and major stockholder in GN to the end of Kennedy’s life.
Mac McCulloch
For a very interesting narrative on the subjected discussed in this thread, I would highly recommend reading a recent book entitiled “Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America”. The author makes references to the major players in the western rail expansion, including Hill, the Associates etc plus ties their exploation of government monies, land grants etc to today’s barrons of industry. My local library had a copy…here is a link to the Amazon entry for more information as well.
http://www.amazon.com/Railroaded-Transcontinentals-Making-Modern-America/dp/0393061264