The Railway Conquest of the World

“One’s experience is varied from camping out in tents at fifty degrees below zero, to spending a large amount of time in the wilderness, when provisions are very short and one h...

Though the task of deciding the path for the railway teems with excitement, adventure and privation, the battle with Nature commences in grim earnest when the constructional eng...

The little country of Switzerland, as is well known, is a tumbled mass of snow-clad mountain ranges. On the Italian frontier, however, this natural barrier becomes more rugged a...

The news of the victory of Stephenson’s “Rocket” in the historic railway locomotive contest at Rainhill on the Liverpool & Manchester railway in 1829 scarcely had filtered round...

“There were difficulties from end to end: from high and steep mountains; from snows; from deserts where there was a scarcity of water, and from gorges and flats where there was...

The Principality is a land of many surprises to the visitor, for it possesses innumerable attractions. Yet it is doubtful whether any feature arouses more interest in North Wale...

Probably there is no country in Europe wherein are compressed so many and such varied marvels of engineering executed in connection with the building of the iron road as in Aust...

Until a few years ago the popular conception of Alaska was a vast country sealed against the efforts of civilisation by impenetrable barriers of snow and ice, presenting such a...

While the majority of railways are constructed to meet the exigencies of commerce, and occasionally from considerations of military strategy, there is one striking instance of a...

While Europe offers the most graphic illustrations of the engineer’s skill and ingenuity in overcoming rugged mountains by tunnelling through their bases, one must go to South A...

Few phrases have become so familiar to the ear as from the “Cape to Cairo.” It is a phrase that has made history, though perhaps not so rapidly as its creator anticipated. When...

While the southern arm of the great line has been pushed on energetically northwards from Cape Town, the northern limb has descended almost as rapidly down the Valley of the Nil...

If one consults a map of the North American continent, it will be observed that the rolling plains, stretching westwards from the shores of the Great Lakes, are fringed on their...

Probably owing to its somewhat remote geographical situation in relation to the busy centres of the northern hemisphere but a hazy conception prevails of the great activity that...

Whereas the Southern Australian and Queensland railways are called upon to meet the demands of agriculture, the roads of Western Australia, on the other hand, have been laid out...

The success with which San Francisco was brought within two or three weeks of Europe by means of the Union and Central Pacific railways prompted far-seeing individuals to aspire...

South America has constituted a happy hunting-ground for the railway engineer determined to carry out his conquest with steam and steel in the face of all opposition on the part...

As the railway expansion of Canada developed by leaps and bounds, ambitious spirits contemplated larger and larger conquests, culminating in a desire to build a link of steel ri...

The Florida express was speeding southwards over the railway which skirts the coast of Florida for mile after mile. Among the passengers was Mr. Henry Flagler, one of America’s...

In order to describe fully the complete conquest which the iron horse has accomplished in British India, volumes would be required. In that country the steel highway has been dr...

The Scandinavian peninsula has been the battle-ground of many titanic struggles on behalf of the railway. In this country the iron horse has forced its way to the most northerly...

Though Meiggs was denied the glory of having built the first South American trans-continental railway, yet the idea has been carried to fruition, but at a point much farther sou...

Buried in the heart of Central Africa, with one border skirting the most southern of the chain of Great African Lakes which nestle in the huge depressions of the continent, is a...

There has been much discussion during recent years concerning the remarkable awakening of China in every ramification of progress and industry, but without a doubt the most wond...

The Chinese, once they were awakened to the possibilities of the railway, were not content to permit their country to be covered with foreign-built lines. They decided to become...

Although the first trans-continental railway across the North American continent tapped San Francisco, this was not the route that was advocated in the first instance. Public fa...