Transportation

Although several people had considered constructing a railroad to Key West beginning in the early 1800s, it took a bold industrialist with unparalleled vision to make it happen.

In 1902, Henry Flagler made the decision to extend the Florida East Coast Railway to "the nearest deepwater American port." In this book, renowned Florida historian Seth H. Bramson reveals how the Key West Extension of the Flagler-owned FEC became the greatest railroad engineering and construction feat in U.S., and possibly world, history, an accomplishment that would cement Flagler's fame and legend for all time. Join Bramson as he recounts the years of operation of this great railroad, what it did for the Florida Keys and what it meant to the resident conchs.

At the turn of the twentieth century, railroads meant progress, growth and development.

In the 1890s Southport, North Carolina became the target destination for a major coaling terminal for ships sailing the Atlantic coast. A new terminal would require a railroad to bring in coal and other supplies. More than twenty companies were formed to pursue this idea over the years, with a few actual accomplishments, but most were purely speculative. Wearying the expectant town for more than twenty-five years, the vision for a great port was whittled down until local entrepreneurs finally built a 30-mile rail line to connect the town to Wilmington.

Local author and railroad historian Mark Koenig chronicles the short life of a short line and the long process of making it a reality.

The surpsing story of the Cog Railway on Mount Washington, and how one eccentric man's dream paved the way.

On July 3, 1869, the three-and-one-third-mile track leading to the summit of picturesque Mount Washington opened for public use. Once, only those daring enough to scale the 6,288 feet could enjoy the splendor of the scenery, but now everyone could journey to the summit using the invention of retired businessman Sylvester Marsh, who dreamed of this mountainous mode of transportation. Created at the height of the age of rail, the Cog Railway continues to chug up the mountain and into the hearts of tourists each year. Local historian Bruce D. Heald ties the history of its construction together with the grand romance of the railway as they triumphantly converge at the top of Mount Washington.

Railroads are central in the history of Georgia. Explore 200 years of railroad expansion and consolidation in this must-read for railroad and Georgia history fans.

Before the start of the Civil War, Georgia had ten railroads, five of which figured significantly in General William T. Sherman's Atlanta Campaign and March to the Sea.

The number of rail lines in the state ballooned after the war. Many were founded by individual entrepreneurs like Henry Plant and Thomas Clyde, while the biggest railroad of them all (Southern Railway) was created out of whole cloth by New York financier J.P. Morgan. At the close of the nineteenth century, consolidation was already in process, and by the end of the next century, only three significant railroads remained in Georgia.

Author and historian Robert C. Jones examines Georgia's rail history over the past two centuries and today.

An amazing piece of Brainerd’s proud past

For over eighty years, the Northern Pacific Railroad Shops was the largest employer in the Brainerd area. After the Depression, the NP provided steady jobs for Brainerd railroad workers, whose paychecks contributed to the growth of Brainerd. The NP Shops built freight cars and conducted maintenance and disassembly of the NP’s rolling stock. The workforce of several trades called themselves “shop dogs.” Shop dogs built a workplace culture with its own jokes, stories, ethics, and nicknames – an unintended circumstance could result in a nickname, such as Scoop Swanson or the Soo Line Bull, that stuck to a shop dog for the rest of his life. After shop dogs retired and the NP shops closed, their nicknames and stories live on. Author Bob Roscoe gathers the stories from this vital piece of Brainerd history.

Told through the eyes of three Irish immigrant families who helped build it, discover the groundbreaking story of the construction of the Blue Ridge Tunnel.

In one of the greatest engineering feats of his time, Claudius Crozet led the completion of Virginia's Blue Ridge Tunnel in 1858. Two centuries later, the National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark still proudly stands, but the stories and lives of those who built it are the true lasting triumph. Irish immigrants fleeing the Great Hunger poured into America resolute for something to call their own. They would persevere through life in overcrowded shanties and years of blasting through rock to see the tunnel to completion. Prolific author Mary E. Lyons follows three Irish families in their struggle to build Crozet's famed tunnel and their American dream.

Local author Jacob R. Mecklenborg reveals a fresh, thought-provoking, full examination of the Cincinnati subway's demise and what its future might hold.

What of those ghostly catacombs that lie dormant below city streets? Those subway tunnels, never finished, never filled with the screeches of trains and the busy commotion of commuters. Just there. Dead. You've heard of the subway's demise. The tunnels were too narrow. The city was too broke. A grand miscalculation. Well, most of what you've heard is, sorry to say, untrue. The popular story of the subway's demise is myth-laden and as incomplete as the original plan. The full story, long buried in mounds of public records dispersed in libraries, is now exposed.