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Slide 2 US HISTORY: SPICONARDI The New Industrial Revolution and Railroad Boom Slide 3 Factors That Led To The Boom New Technology The Air Brake Invented by George Westinghouse, the air brake allowed all railcars to stop at once Prior to this, a train traveling 50 mph would have to start braking two miles before the station Slide 4 Factors That Led To The Boom Gauges the distance between to parallel rails Allowed American railroads to join together to create networks. Prior to this, certain trains could not travel on certain tracks Slide 5 Gauge sizes throughout the world Slide 6 Roman Chariot and its influence on the development of gauges Slide 7 Factors That Led To The Boom Oil The development of oil into gasoline gave engines a new source of power Slide 8 Factors That Led To The Boom Steel The Bessemer Process allowed steel to be made stronger at a much lower cost (85% decrease in costs). Slide 9 Factors That Led To The Boom More Comfortable Travel Pullman Sleeping Cars Dining Cars Increased ridership Slide 10 The Railroad Boom Two more transcontinental railroads built New Jobs Needed people to Produce steel Mine iron & coal for steel Drill oil Construct gauges Construct new tracks Slide 11 Slide 12 The Railroad Boom Companies and Practices Elimination of Competition Consolidation combine smaller railroad companies to create large railroad corporations Believed this would lead to more efficient operations of the railroads The Pennsylvania Railroad Co. was actually comprised of 73 smaller railroad companies Slide 13 The Railroad Boom Rebates a special discount given to a railroad companys best customers If a shipper promised to exclusively use a railroad company, they would be granted the special low freight rate This allowed a shipper to undercut their competitors Smaller railroad companies and shipping companies would go out of business due to rebates Modern day rebate for an HP LaserJet printer Slide 14 The Railroad Boom Pools Railroad companies in the same market would agree to divide up business to avoid competition This led to price fixing Price fixing Railroad companies would conspire to charge the same high shipping rates to customers Slide 15 The Railroad Boom Cornelius Vanderbilt Railroad tycoon known as the Commodore Would buy massive amounts of stock in Railroad companies to take them over Controlled all the railroad lines into Manhattan New York Central and Hudson, Harlem, New Haven lines Known as a ruthless business man Wound up buying most of the rail lines between Buffalo and Chicago Slide 16 Grand Central Depot Slide 17