For thousands of years rivers and oceans served as the primary highways for commercial transportation. What is commonly called the First Transportation Revolution began in 1807 with Robert Fulton’s steamboat The North River Steamboat (also known as The Clermont). This event marked the beginning of industrialized transportation—that is, transportation in which energy is provided by mechanical means. Steamboats allowed for faster transportation and transportation which was not dependent on water currents or wind. With steamboats American rivers such as the Mississippi and the Hudson became more efficient two-way highways.
The early steam boats used paddlewheels driven by steam engines. In some cases a single paddle where would be mounted at the stern of the boat (sternwheelers) and in other cases two paddlewheels would be mounted on the sides of the boat (sidewheelers). The first successful steamboat, The North River Steamboat, was a sidewheeler which carried passengers between New York City and Albany, a distance of 150 miles on the Hudson River. The steamboat was able to make the trip in 32 hours. Regular passenger services started on September 4, 1807 with the steamboat leaving New York on Saturdays at 6:00 PM and returning from Albany on Wednesdays at 8:00 AM. By 1819, there were nine steamboats operating on the Hudson River and by 1840 there were more than 100.
Shown above is a replica of The North River Steamboat.
In the west, steamboats began plying their trade on the Columbia River in 1850. Economically, the transport of passengers was more lucrative than hauling freight.
Shown above is the paddlewheel from the Columbia River sternwheeler Henderson which is on display at the History Museum in Hood River, Oregon.
By 1860, steamboats on the Missouri-Mississippi River were transporting goods as far inland as Fort Benton, Montana. Steamboats could make the 3,000 mile trip between St. Louis and Fort Benton in less than a month.
Shown above is a model of a Missouri River steamboat.
Two decades after the beginning of the steamboat era, the First Transportation Revolution took another step with the development of railroads which freed transportation to move west into riverless areas. Railroads were not an American invention, but were inspired by developments in Great Britain where the Stockton and Darlington Railway was the world’s first public railway to use steam locomotives.
In 1827, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company of Baltimore was chartered. Construction began on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in 1828 and the railroad began operation in 1830. While the first carriages to run on the tracks were horse-drawn, steam power was soon used.
The Tom Thumb (a replica is shown above) was the first American-made steam locomotive to be used on a common-carrier railroad. It was designed and built by Peter Cooper in order to convince the owners of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad to use steam engines.
By 1860, the United States had about 30,000 miles of railroad and 30% of the investment in the expansion of the rail system had been provided by the federal government. Construction of the first transcontinental railroad in the United States began in 1863. In 1869, the last spike in the transcontinental railroad was driven at Promontory Summit in Utah connecting the East with the West. Planning for a transcontinental rail system had actually begun in 1853 under the direction of the Department of War.
The transcontinental railroads expanded across the continent, opening up new lands in the west for settlement and mining exploitation. In the west, the expansion of the railroads faced a labor shortage. This was alleviated in part by immigrant Chinese manual laborers who were escaping poverty and the Taiping Revolution in China. Skilled jobs were often filled by Irish immigrants.
The transcontinental rail system in the United States, in conjunction with the homestead act, increased the population in the American west; in conjunction with business interests it accelerated the exploitation of mineral, timber, and agricultural resources; and, in conjunction with the increase in population and business interested, it helped with the destruction of Indian lands, Indian reservations, and tribal governments.