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The Train and the Telegraph : A Revisionist History /

To many people in the nineteenth century, the railroad and the telegraph were powerful, transformative forces, ones that seemed to work closely together to shape the economy, society, and politics of the United States. However, the perception--both popular and scholarly--of the intrinsic connections...

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Bibliographic Details
Call Number:Libro Electrónico
Main Author: Schwantes, Benjamin Sidney Michael, 1978- (Author)
Format: Electronic eBook
Language:Inglés
Published: Baltimore, Maryland : Project Muse, 2019
Series:Hagley library studies in business, technology, and politics.
Book collections on Project MUSE.
Subjects:
Online Access:Texto completo
Description
Summary:To many people in the nineteenth century, the railroad and the telegraph were powerful, transformative forces, ones that seemed to work closely together to shape the economy, society, and politics of the United States. However, the perception--both popular and scholarly--of the intrinsic connections between these two institutions has largely obscured a far more complex and contested relationship, one that created profound divisions between entrepreneurial telegraph promoters and warier railroad managers. In The Train and the Telegraph, Benjamin Sidney Michael Schwantes argues that uncertainty, mutual suspicion, and cautious experimentation more aptly describe how railroad officials and telegraph entrepreneurs hesitantly established a business and technical relationship. The two industries, Schwantes reveals, were drawn together gradually through external factors such as war, state and federal safety regulations, and financial necessity, rather than because of any perception that the two industries were naturally related or beneficial to each other. Complicating the existing scholarship by demonstrating that the railroad and telegraph in the United States were uneasy partners at best--and more often outright antagonists--throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, The Train and the Telegraph will appeal to scholars of communication, transportation, and American business history and political economy, as well as to enthusiasts of the nineteenth-century American railroad industry.
Item Description:Based on author's thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Delaware.
Issued as part of book collections on Project MUSE.
Physical Description:1 online resource (224 pages): illustrations, map.
Bibliography:Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN:9781421429755
Access:Access restricted to authorized users and institutions.