Missouri and the Railroads
“No single force changed the lives of Missourians more during the last half of the nineteenth century than did the railroads.”
-Historians Lawrence Christensen and Gary Kramer, 1997
Quick facts
Trains
first began to run on Missouri tracks in 1852.
Miles of track in Missouri doubled from 2000 to 4000 in the 1870s.
Quick Quiz (Match the events to their dates. Answers are at the end of this page.)
1. First railroad trip from St. Louis to Kansas City
2. At the first railroad convention west of the Mississippi, Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton pointed West. An advocate of America's manifest destiny to rule from "sea to shining sea," he told the gathering in St. Louis that westward expansion was the true way to reach the riches of the east.
3. Because railroads needed to keep trains from smashing into each other, the U.S. adopted standard time zones across the country.
4. By pulling up wooden sidewalks to find something to eat, wild hogs created such a nuisance in Edina, Missouri, that the town took the revolutionary step of passing an ordinance against throwing garbage in the streets.
5. The Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad was the only railway line crossing the entire state.
a.
September 21, 1865 - the year the Civil War Ended
b. Noon, November 8, 1883
c. 1890 - the start of the Gilded Age
d. 1849 - the tragic year of the great riverfront fire and 8,000 cholera deaths
e. 1861 - the year the Civil War began
Some
history is just too good
to be forgotten.
Hear
two of Missouri's best as performed by
renowned storyteller Donna Ross.
A Little Border War
Anonymous (For good reason)
Old
Governor Lucas, tiger-like,
Is prowling round our borders,
But Governor Boggs is wide awake-
Just to listen to his orders:
Three
bee trees stand about the line between our state and Lucas.
Be ready all these trees to fall
And bring things to a focus.
Ye
freemen of this happy land,
Which flows with milk and honey,
Arise! To arms! Your ponies mount! Regard not blood or money.
Lilburn Boggs took the blame for two troublesome times--the panic of 1837 and the Honey War of 1839. After his term as governor, he went back home to keep his general store in Independence and run for state senate. While Boggs sat reading by a window in his house, an unhappy Missourian pumped a load of buckshot into his head on May 6, 1842. He recovered, but no one was ever brought to justice for the attack.
Join
in the Fun as We
Make Merry Melodrama
The most popular form of dramatic entertainment in the Nineteenth Century was the good old fashioned Hiss-and-Boo melodrama with its larger than life heroes and its meaner than Machiavelli villains.
Critic Heywood Hale Braun wrote that as 1900 approached, melodrama got bigger if not better. Producers double-cast shows--Uncle Tom's Cabin with two little Evas and two Simon Legrees.
Rivalry to present the the noisiest, the gaudiest, the most spectacular shows grew so outrageous that John Stetson, a Boston theatrical manager, discarded the ho-hum look of a Last Supper tableau in a Biblical play he was rehearsing. He overruled his stage manager’s amazed insistence that there had been only twelve Apostles in the Bible. Stetson thundered, "I know what I want! Gimme 24.”
Quick Quiz Answers.
1. a (The first St. Louis to Kansas City Train - 1865)
2. d (The first Railroad Convention west of the Mississippi - 1849)
3. b (Standard times zone creation - 1883)
4. c (Edina, Missouri has big pig trouble - 1890)
5. e (Before the Civil War, Missouri has just 900 miles of track and only the Hannibal and St. Joe crossing the entire state - 1861)
Come Frolic on the Fringe of FEAR!
Follow the Red Horseman link to learn about a delightfully deft and daffy discourse on The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And what a deal! During these days when everyone is looking for a bargain, Mrs. McBustle throws in a fifth horseman for free. You don't even need a money-saving coupon!
