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All about the pony express
All about the pony express
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More handpicked essays just for you.
All about the pony express
All about the pony express
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There were 3 railroad tycoons that helped grow Washington state. These tycoons were Henry Villard, Jay Cooke and James Hill. All of these men helped build a railroad to Washington in some way or another. Building a railroad was important because it meant that people could travel easier and faster to Washington. This made Washington’s population grow.
They emigrated from Russia and met in the United States. By 1900 they had a little shop and it grew up quickly that they moved their business into Asch Building in the 8th floor then they moved to the tenth floor. There were approximately 500 people, mostly women who worked at the Triangle Waist Company. They worked at 7: 30 AM during the busy season, until nine o'clock in the evening. They didn't get paid any overtime on their paychecks.
The three top railroads that ran through Cleveland agreed to raise their shipping fees while paying rebates to Rockefeller .Small oil refiners were hurt from these brutal tactics and Ida decided to write “ The History Of Standard Oil Company” which exposed these harsh business practices
J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and Andrew Carnegie were great inventors of their time but they did things that made them Robber Barons. One large reason why they are a robber baron is that they wanted to get more money without caring for anybody working for him or working with their companies. J.P. Morgan was criticized for manipulating the financial system in order to make more money for himself. J.P. Morgan made a successful bank that is one of the leading banks today, CHASE. John D. Rockefeller made his money by creating an oil business.
He bought out many railways to connecting routes with whom he had conflicts with which increased his range of transportation. He also incorporated lower rates with better service. With the advancement of connecting railways farmers were mad because they had to compete with a larger range of other farmers and deal with increasing transport prices. Next there is Rockefeller who used Vanderbilt’s tactics to dominate the oil industry. He bought out rival refineries and created the first American monopoly called Standard Oil Company, which he was the over seer.
As our country reached the late 1800’s, Americans found themselves face to face with era known as the ‘Gilded Age’. Companies were created and grew rapidly during this time period. Some of the most famous entrepreneurs were John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie, who seemed to be the perfect models for the ‘rags to riches’ story. Many people debate which entrepreneur was a better role-model. Due to his low prices, the high demand for his products, and the way he sought to eliminate any possible competition, John D. Rockefeller is clearly the better role-model for today’s entrepreneurs.
The railroad was first designed by George Stephenson whose original idea was to use steam to run the train and make transportation faster. When the US started using railroads and trains they purchased them from the Stephen Works company from Britain. “In the 1850s a boom in railroad development across the North was changing business organization and management and reducing freight costs. Railroads were influencing a rise in real estate values, increasing regional concentrations of industry, the size of business units and stimulating growth in investment banking and agriculture.
The Baltimore and Ohio (B&O) Railroad Company in 1828 was the first company to prove that railroads were profitable and practical. The railroads were a major advancement in the United States. The reason for these changes
Pioneers visionaries like Rockefeller, Morgan, Carnegie and Ward made America strong by building large businesses which helped the nation grow. Their jobs were not simple, they advanced technology while trying to develop their industry. They had to make companies compete against each other, drove rivals out of the market, used railroads to eliminate competitors, made failing companies into big corporations, helped the growth of the economy and invented advanced ways to make people's life easier. Before these visionaries companies were shutting down, life was harder for the farmers and the economy was worsening. With the discovery of oil, machines were lubricated, medicine was made and kerosene lamps were invented.
Rockefeller, who controlled the oil industry at the time, Cornelius Vanderbilt and George Pullman, they controlled the railroad industry, Andrew Carnegie, who controlled the steel industry and J.P Morgan a figure in the United States economy. Their industries later created monopolies, which is the complete possession or control of supply or trade in a raw material or service. John D. Rockefeller was the first monopoly. They created trusts in order to eliminate any competition. Workers noticed that they weren’t being treated equally.
There were many technological innovations during the Gilded Age and most came from great minds of men like Carnegie, Vanderbilt, and Rockefeller. These innovations, such as the railroads, steel, and electricity, helped pave the way towards the strong and powerful America we know today. Railroads today are hardly ever used anymore except to ship huge loads of materials from one end of the country to the other, but even then, there are other efficient means for the travel of such products such as by plane, but back then in the Gilded Age, railroads were a huge part of the political and high class society of America. To control an important railroad was to have power in the society of America back then, and your power and class position would go up even higher with many such railroads under your belt. Such was the case for Vanderbilt, who had crucial railroads under his control and authority.
The similarities between the east and west didn’t stop there, with the introduction of the railroad the west became a booming place for business. A lot of smart business men saw this potential and jumped on it just as they had building huge manufacturing plants on the east coast they bought up land to create mega ranches that eventually put a lot of the smaller farms out of
Barons such as Andrew Carnegie, J.P Morgan, and John Rockefeller dominated the country through the enormous wealth that they amassed. The power that these individuals wielded was unfathomable. They even bought the presidency. It was through their combined might that William McKinley was elected. This pushed their power and wealth to even greater heights.
In between California and the rest of the country were the Great Plains which were not heavily populated so there was no easy way of trade and transportation to the growing western territories. A group of men called the “Big Four” which consisted of Collis Huntington, Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker and Mark Hopkins, decided what the country needed was a transcontinental railroad. Their company, The Central Pacific Railroad company would hire 15,000 Chinese men to work on constructing the railroad due to the fact that they would work for less than the average American. This made transportation cheaper and quicker than ever
In this, he proved he had much foresight, as this was the million-dollar idea of the century that made him only more wealthy, as railroads were the new steamships. As he saw the needs of America in transportation, he filled them. Be it steamships or railroads, he took risks in his own businesses and he was a great businessman . As he worked with railroads, his lines traveled west, helping settle the Northwestern part of the United States. T.J. Styles stated “This was a major transformation of the railroad network, which previously had been fragmented into numerous short railroads, each with its own procedures, timetables, and rolling stock.