1.
Reporting mark
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A reporting mark is an alphabetic code of one to four letters used to identify owners or lessees of rolling stock and other equipment used on certain railroad networks. In North America the mark, which consists of an code of one to four letters, is stenciled on each piece of equipment. The Association of American Railroads assigns marks to all carriers, under authority granted by the U. S, surface Transportation Board, Transport Canada, and Mexican Government. Under current practice, the first letter must match the initial letter of the railroad name, as it also acts as a Standard Carrier Alpha Code, the reporting mark cannot conflict with codes in use by other nonrail carriers. In another example, the mark for state-funded Amtrak services in California is CDTX because the state transportation agency owns the equipment used in these services. This is why the reporting mark for CSX Transportation, which is a railroad, is CSXT instead of CSX. This often resulted in five-letter reporting marks, an option not otherwise allowed by the AAR, the standard ISO6346 covers identifiers for intermodal containers. When the owner of a mark is taken over by another company. For example, when the Union Pacific Railroad acquired the Chicago and North Western Railway in the 1990s, some companies own several marks that are used to identify different classes of cars, such as boxcars or gondolas. If the acquiring company discontinues the name or mark of the acquired company, occasionally, long-disused marks are suddenly revived by the companies which now own them. For example, in recent years, the Union Pacific Railroad has begun to use the mark CMO on newly built covered hoppers, gondolas, CMO originally belonged to a predecessor of the CNW, which passed it on to them, from which the UP inherited it. Some of these still retain their temporary NYC marks. Because of its size, this list has been split into subpages based on the first letter of the reporting mark, railinc, a subsidiary of the AAR, maintains the active reporting marks for the North American rail industry. Railinc offers a free online look-up of reporting marks and other industry reference files through the Railincs Freight Rail 411 website, a railway vehicle must be registered in a national vehicle register using a 12-digit number derived from the old UIC system of vehicle numbering. The number contains the country in the third and fourth digit. The VKM must not contain special signs or digits, the VKM is preceded by the code for the country, where the vehicle is registered and a hyphen. Some examples, When a vehicle is sold it does not normally be transferred to another register, the Czech railways bought large numbers of coaches from ÖBB. The number remained the same but the VKM changed from A-ÖBB to A-ČD, the UIC introduced a uniform numbering system for their members based on a 12-digit number, largely known as UIC number
2.
Kansas
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Kansas /ˈkænzəs/ is a U. S. state located in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka and its largest city is Wichita, Kansas is named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribes name is said to mean people of the wind or people of the south wind. For thousands of years, what is now Kansas was home to numerous, tribes in the eastern part of the state generally lived in villages along the river valleys. Tribes in the part of the state were semi-nomadic and hunted large herds of bison. When it was opened to settlement by the U. S. Thus, the area was a hotbed of violence and chaos in its early days as these forces collided. The abolitionists eventually prevailed, and on January 29,1861, after the Civil War, the population of Kansas grew rapidly when waves of immigrants turned the prairie into farmland. By 2015, Kansas was one of the most productive agricultural states, producing high yields of wheat, corn, sorghum, and soybeans. Kansas, which has an area of 82,278 square miles is the 15th largest state by area and is the 34th most populous of the 50 United States with a population of 2,911,641, residents of Kansas are called Kansans, officially. Mount Sunflower is Kansass highest point at 4,041 feet, for a millennia, the land that is currently Kansas was inhabited by Native Americans. The first European to set foot in present-day Kansas was Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, in 1803, most of modern Kansas was secured by the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase. Southwest Kansas, however, was still a part of Spain, Mexico, from 1812 to 1821, Kansas was part of the Missouri Territory. The Santa Fe Trail traversed Kansas from 1821 to 1880, transporting manufactured goods from Missouri and silver and furs from Santa Fe, wagon ruts from the trail are still visible in the prairie today. In 1827, Fort Leavenworth became the first permanent settlement of white Americans in the future state, the Kansas–Nebraska Act became law on May 30,1854, establishing the U. S. territories of Nebraska and Kansas, and opening the area to broader settlement by whites. Kansas Territory stretched all the way to the Continental Divide and included the sites of present-day Denver, Colorado Springs, Missouri and Arkansas sent settlers into Kansas all along its eastern border. These settlers attempted to sway votes in favor of slavery, the secondary settlement of Americans in Kansas Territory were abolitionists from Massachusetts and other Free-Staters, who attempted to stop the spread of slavery from neighboring Missouri. Directly presaging the American Civil War, these forces collided, entering into skirmishes that earned the territory the name of Bleeding Kansas, Kansas was admitted to the United States as a free state on January 29,1861, making it the 34th state to enter the Union. He was roundly condemned by both the conventional Confederate military and the partisan rangers commissioned by the Missouri legislature and his application to that body for a commission was flatly rejected due to his pre-war criminal record
3.
Missouri
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Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, achieving statehood in 1821. With over six million residents, it is the eighteenth most populous state, the largest urban areas are St. Louis, Kansas City, Springfield, and Columbia. The capitol is in Jefferson City on the Missouri River, the state is the twenty-first most extensive by area and is geographically diverse. The Northern Plains were once covered by glaciers, then tallgrass prairie, in the South are the Ozarks, a forested highland, providing timber, minerals, and recreation. The Mississippi River forms the border of the state, eventually flowing into the swampy Missouri Bootheel. Humans have inhabited what we now call Missouri for at least 12,000 years, the Mississippian culture built cities and mounds, before declining in the 1300s. When European explorers arrived in the 1600s they encountered the Osage, the French established Louisiana, a part of New France, and founded Ste. Genevieve in 1735 and St. Louis in 1764, after a brief period of Spanish rule, the United States acquired the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Americans from the Upland South, including enslaved African Americans, rushed into the new Missouri Territory, many from Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee settled in the Boonslick area of Mid-Missouri. Soon after, heavy German immigration formed the Missouri Rhineland, Missouri played a central role in the westward expansion of the United States, as memorialized by the Gateway Arch. The Pony Express, Oregon Trail, Santa Fe Trail, as a border state, Missouris role in the American Civil War was complex and there were many conflicts within. After the war, both Greater St. Louis and the Kansas City metropolitan area became centers of industrialization and business, today, the state is divided into 114 counties and the independent city of St. Louis. Missouris culture blends elements from the Midwestern and Southern United States, the musical styles of ragtime, Kansas City jazz, and St. Louis Blues, developed in Missouri. The well-known Kansas City-style barbecue, and lesser known St. Louis-style barbecue can be found across the state, St. Louis is also a major center of beer brewing, Anheuser-Busch is the largest producer in the world. Missouri wine is produced in the nearby Missouri Rhineland and Ozarks, Missouris alcohol laws are among the most permissive in the United States. Outside of the large cities popular tourist destinations include the Lake of the Ozarks, U. S. President Harry S. Truman is from Missouri. Other well known Missourians include Mark Twain, Walt Disney, Chuck Berry, some of the largest companies based in the state include Express Scripts, Monsanto, Emerson Electric, Edward Jones, and OReilly Auto Parts. Missouri has been called the Mother of the West and the Cave State, however, Missouris most famous nickname is the Show Me State, the state is named for the Missouri River, which was named after the indigenous Missouri Indians, a Siouan-language tribe
4.
Oklahoma
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Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central United States. Oklahoma is the 20th-most extensive and the 28th-most populous of the 50 United States, the states name is derived from the Choctaw words okla and humma, meaning red people. The name was settled upon statehood, Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory were merged, on November 16,1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state to enter the union. Its residents are known as Oklahomans, or informally Okies, and its capital, a major producer of natural gas, oil, and agricultural products, Oklahoma relies on an economic base of aviation, energy, telecommunications, and biotechnology. In 2007, it had one of the economies in the United States, ranking among the top states in per capita income growth. Oklahoma City and Tulsa serve as Oklahomas primary economic anchors, with nearly two-thirds of Oklahomans living within their metropolitan statistical areas. With small mountain ranges, prairie, mesas, and eastern forests, most of Oklahoma lies in the Great Plains, Cross Timbers, interior Highlands—a region especially prone to severe weather. The name Oklahoma comes from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, literally meaning red people, equivalent to the English word Indian, okla humma was a phrase in the Choctaw language used to describe Native American people as a whole. Oklahoma later became the de facto name for Oklahoma Territory, and it was approved in 1890. Oklahoma is the 20th-largest state in the United States, covering an area of 69,898 square miles and it is one of six states on the Frontier Strip and lies partly in the Great Plains near the geographical center of the 48 contiguous states. It is bounded on the east by Arkansas and Missouri, on the north by Kansas, on the northwest by Colorado, on the far west by New Mexico, much of its border with Texas lies along the Southern Oklahoma Aulacogen, a failed continental rift. The geologic figure defines the placement of the Red River, the Oklahoma panhandles Western edge is out of alignment with its Texas border. The Oklahoma/New Mexico border is actually 2.1 to 2.2 miles east of the Texas line, the border between Texas and New Mexico was set first as a result of a survey by Spain in 1819. It was then set along the 103rd Meridian, in the 1890s, when Oklahoma was formally surveyed using more accurate surveying equipment and techniques, it was discovered the Texas line was not set along the 103rd Meridian. Surveying techniques were not as accurate in 1819, and the actual 103rd Meridian was approximately 2.2 miles to the east and it was much easier to leave the mistake than for Texas to cede land to New Mexico to correct the surveying error. The placement of the Oklahoma/New Mexico border represents the true 103rd Meridian, cimarron County in Oklahomas panhandle is the only county in the United States that touches four other states, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and Kansas. Its highest and lowest points follow this trend, with its highest peak, Black Mesa, at 4,973 feet above sea level, situated near its far northwest corner in the Oklahoma Panhandle. The states lowest point is on the Little River near its far southeastern boundary near the town of Idabel, Oklahoma, which dips to 289 feet above sea level
5.
Texas
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Texas is the second largest state in the United States by both area and population. Other major cities include Austin, the second most populous state capital in the U. S. Texas is nicknamed the Lone Star State to signify its former status as an independent republic, and as a reminder of the states struggle for independence from Mexico. The Lone Star can be found on the Texan state flag, the origin of Texass name is from the word Tejas, which means friends in the Caddo language. Due to its size and geologic features such as the Balcones Fault, although Texas is popularly associated with the U. S. southwestern deserts, less than 10 percent of Texas land area is desert. Most of the centers are located in areas of former prairies, grasslands, forests. Traveling from east to west, one can observe terrain that ranges from coastal swamps and piney woods, to rolling plains and rugged hills, the term six flags over Texas refers to several nations that have ruled over the territory. Spain was the first European country to claim the area of Texas, Mexico controlled the territory until 1836 when Texas won its independence, becoming an independent Republic. In 1845, Texas joined the United States as the 28th state, the states annexation set off a chain of events that caused the Mexican–American War in 1846. A slave state before the American Civil War, Texas declared its secession from the U. S. in early 1861, after the Civil War and the restoration of its representation in the federal government, Texas entered a long period of economic stagnation. One Texan industry that thrived after the Civil War was cattle, due to its long history as a center of the industry, Texas is associated with the image of the cowboy. The states economic fortunes changed in the early 20th century, when oil discoveries initiated a boom in the state. With strong investments in universities, Texas developed a diversified economy, as of 2010 it shares the top of the list of the most Fortune 500 companies with California at 57. With a growing base of industry, the leads in many industries, including agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, computers and electronics, aerospace. Texas has led the nation in export revenue since 2002 and has the second-highest gross state product. The name Texas, based on the Caddo word tejas meaning friends or allies, was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves, during Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas, La Provincia de Texas. Texas is the second largest U. S. state, behind Alaska, though 10 percent larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan, it ranks only 27th worldwide amongst country subdivisions by size. If it were an independent country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile, Texas is in the south central part of the United States of America. Three of its borders are defined by rivers, the Rio Grande forms a natural border with the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south
6.
Union Pacific
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The Union Pacific Railroad is a freight hauling railroad that operates 8,500 locomotives over 32,100 route-miles in 23 states west of Chicago, Illinois and New Orleans, Louisiana. The Union Pacific Railroad network is the largest in the United States and it is also one of the worlds largest transportation companies. Union Pacific Railroad is the operating company of Union Pacific Corporation. Union Pacific Corporations main competitor is the BNSF Railway, the second largest freight railroad. Together, the two railroads have a duopoly on all freight rail lines in the U. S. The original company was incorporated on July 1,1862, under an act of Congress entitled Pacific Railroad Act of 1862. The act was approved by President Abraham Lincoln, and it provided for the construction of railroads from the Missouri River to the Pacific as a war measure for the preservation of the Union. It was constructed westward from Council Bluffs, Iowa to meet the Central Pacific Railroad line, the line was constructed primarily by Irish labor who had learned their craft during the recent Civil War. The two lines were joined together at Promontory Summit, Utah,53 miles west of Ogden on May 10,1869, hence creating the first transcontinental railroad in North America. Under the guidance of its dominant stockholder Dr. Thomas Clark Durant, the namesake of the city of Durant, Iowa, the first rails were laid in Omaha. It built or purchased local lines that gave it access to Denver, Colorado, to Portland, Oregon and it also owned narrow gauge trackage into the heart of the Colorado Rockies and a standard gauge line south from Denver across New Mexico into Texas. UP was entangled in the Crédit Mobilier scandal, exposed in 1872 and its independent construction company the Crédit Mobilier had bribed congressmen. The UP itself was not guilty but it did get bad publicity, the financial crisis of 1873 led to financial troubles but not bankruptcy. The company was reorganized as the Union Pacific Railway on January 24,1880, the new company declared bankruptcy during the Panic of 1893. When it emerged in 1897 it reverted to the original name, the corporate headquarters of the Union Pacific Corporation were located in New York City from its initial founding in the 1860s until Drew Lewis became CEO in the mid-1980s. He relocated it to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, later the headquarters was shifted to Dallas, Texas, before relocating to Omaha to join the operating headquarters. From the ICC annual reports, except 1979 is from Moodys, on December 31,1925 UP-OSL-OWRN-LA&SL-StJ&GI operated 9,834 route-miles and 15,265 track-miles. At the end of 1980, Union Pacific operated 9,266 route-miles and 15,647 miles of track, Moodys shows 220,697 million revenue ton-miles in 1993 on the expanded system
7.
Track gauge
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In rail transport, track gauge is the spacing of the rails on a railway track and is measured between the inner faces of the load-bearing rails. All vehicles on a network must have running gear that is compatible with the track gauge, as the dominant parameter determining interoperability, it is still frequently used as a descriptor of a route or network. There is a distinction between the gauge and actual gauge at some locality, due to divergence of track components from the nominal. Railway engineers use a device, like a caliper, to measure the actual gauge, the nominal track gauge is the distance between the inner faces of the rails. In current practice, it is specified at a distance below the rail head as the inner faces of the rail head are not necessarily vertical. In some cases in the earliest days of railways, the company saw itself as an infrastructure provider only. Colloquially the wagons might be referred to as four-foot gauge wagons, say and this nominal value does not equate to the flange spacing, as some freedom is allowed for. An infrastructure manager might specify new or replacement track components at a variation from the nominal gauge for pragmatic reasons. Track is defined in old Imperial units or in universally accepted metric units or SI units, Imperial units were established in United Kingdom by The Weights and Measures Act of 1824. In addition, there are constraints, such as the load-carrying capacity of axles. Narrow gauge railways usually cost less to build because they are lighter in construction, using smaller cars and locomotives, as well as smaller bridges, smaller tunnels. Narrow gauge is often used in mountainous terrain, where the savings in civil engineering work can be substantial. Broader gauge railways are generally expensive to build and require wider curves. There is no single perfect gauge, because different environments and economic considerations come into play, a narrow gauge is superior if ones main considerations are economy and tight curvature. For direct, unimpeded routes with high traffic, a broad gauge may be preferable, the Standard, Russian, and 46 gauges are designed to strike a reasonable balance between these factors. In addition to the general trade-off, another important factor is standardization, once a standard has been chosen, and equipment, infrastructure, and training calibrated to that standard, conversion becomes difficult and expensive. This also makes it easier to adopt an existing standard than to invent a new one and this is true of many technologies, including railroad gauges. The reduced cost, greater efficiency, and greater economic opportunity offered by the use of a common standard explains why a number of gauges predominate worldwide
8.
Standard gauge
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The standard gauge is a widely used railway track gauge. Approximately 55% of the lines in the world are this gauge, all high-speed rail lines, except those in Russia, Uzbekistan, and Finland, are standard gauge. The distance between the edges of the rails is defined to be 1435 mm except in the United States. It is also called the UIC gauge or UIC track gauge, as railways developed and expanded, one of the key issues was the track gauge to be used. The result was the adoption throughout a large part of the world of a gauge of 1435 mm. In North East England, some lines in colliery areas were 4 ft 8 in. All these lines had been widened to standard gauge by 1846, parts of the United States, mainly in the Northeast, adopted the same gauge, because some early trains were purchased from Britain. However, until well into the half of the 19th century, Britain. The American gauges converged as the advantages of equipment interchange became increasingly apparent, notably, all the 5 ft broad gauge track in the South was converted to standard gauge over the course of two days beginning on 31 May 1886. See Track gauge in the United States, snopes categorized this legend as false, but commented that. It is perhaps more fairly labelled as True, but for trivial, the historical tendency to place the wheels of horse-drawn vehicles approximately 5 feet apart probably derives from the width needed to fit a carthorse in between the shafts. Others were 4 ft 4 in or 4 ft 7 1⁄2 in, the English railway pioneer George Stephenson spent much of his early engineering career working for the coal mines of County Durham. He favoured 4 ft 8 in for wagonways in Northumberland and Durham, the Hetton and Springwell wagonways also used this gauge. Stephensons Stockton and Darlington railway was primarily to transport coal from mines near Shildon to the port at Stockton-on-Tees. The initial gauge of 4 ft 8 in was set to accommodate the existing gauge of hundreds of horse-drawn chaldron wagons that were already in use on the wagonways in the mines. The railway used this gauge for 15 years before a change was made to 4 ft 8 1⁄2 in gauge, George Stephenson used the 4 ft 8 1⁄2 in gauge for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, authorised in 1826 and opened 30 September 1830. The success of this led to Stephenson and his son Robert being employed to engineer several other larger railway projects. Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway, authorised 1824 and opened 1825, used 4 ft 6 in, Dundee and Newtyle Railway, authorised 1829 and opened 1831, used 4 ft 6 1⁄2 in
9.
Dallas
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Dallas is a major city in the U. S. state of Texas. It is the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the citys population ranks ninth in the U. S. and third in Texas after Houston and San Antonio. The citys prominence arose from its importance as a center for the oil and cotton industries. The bulk of the city is in Dallas County, of which it is the county seat, however, sections of the city are located in Collin, Denton, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties. According to the 2010 United States Census, the city had a population of 1,197,816, the United States Census Bureaus estimate for the citys population increased to 1,300,092 as of July 1,2015. In 2016 DFW ascended to the one spot in the nation in year-over-year population growth. In 2014, the metropolitan economy surpassed Washington, D. C. to become the fifth largest in the U. S. with a 2014 real GDP over $504 billion, as such, the metropolitan areas economy is the 10th largest in the world. As of January 2017, the job count has increased to 3,558,200 jobs. The citys economy is based on banking, commerce, telecommunications, technology, energy, healthcare and medical research. The city is home to the third-largest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the nation. Located in North Texas, Dallas is the core of the largest metropolitan area in the South. Dallas and nearby Fort Worth were developed due to the construction of railroad lines through the area allowing access to cotton, cattle. Later, France also claimed the area but never established much settlement, the area remained under Spanish rule until 1821, when Mexico declared independence from Spain, and the area was considered part of the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. In 1836, the Republic of Texas, with majority Anglo-American settlers, in 1839, Warren Angus Ferris surveyed the area around present-day Dallas. John Neely Bryan established a permanent settlement near the Trinity River named Dallas in 1841, the origin of the name is uncertain. The Republic of Texas was annexed by the United States in 1845, Dallas was formally incorporated as a city on February 2,1856. With construction of railroads, Dallas became a business and trading center and it became an industrial city, attracting workers from Texas, the South and the Midwest. The Praetorian Building of 15 stories, built in 1909, was the first skyscraper west of the Mississippi and it marked the prominence of Dallas as a city
10.
Missouri Pacific Railroad
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The Missouri Pacific Railroad, commonly abbreviated MoPac, with nickname of The Mop, was one of the first railroads in the United States west of the Mississippi River. In 1967, the railroad operated 9,041 miles of road and 13,318 miles of track, not including DK&S, NO&LC, T&P and its subsidiaries, C&EI, on January 8,1980, the Union Pacific Railroad agreed to buy the Missouri Pacific Railroad. Lawsuits filed by competing railroads delayed approval of the merger until September 13,1982, after the Supreme Court denied a trial to the Southern Pacific, the merger took effect on December 22,1982. However, due to outstanding bonds of the Missouri Pacific, the merger with Union Pacific become official only on January 1,1997. On July 4,1851, at St. Louis, ground was broken on the Pacific Railroad, the first section of track was completed in 1852, in 1865, it was the first railroad in Kansas City, after construction was interrupted by the American Civil War. In 1872, the Pacific Railroad was reorganized as the Missouri Pacific Railway by new investors after a debt crisis. Because of corporate ties extending back to the Pacific Railroad, Missouri Pacific at one time advertised itself as being The First Railroad West of the Mississippi, from 1879 Missouri Pacific was under the control of successful but controversial New York financier Jay Gould until his death in 1892. Gould developed a system extending through Colorado, Nebraska, Arkansas, Texas and his son George Gould inherited control upon his fathers death. The younger Gould lost control of the company after it declared bankruptcy in 1915, in 1917 the line was merged with the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railway and reorganized as the Missouri Pacific Railroad. Missouri Pacific later acquired or gained a controlling interest in other lines in Texas, including the Gulf Coast Lines, International-Great Northern Railroad, MoPac declared bankruptcy again in 1933, during the Great Depression, and entered into trusteeship. The company was reorganized and the trusteeship ended in 1956, MoPac operated a fleet of more than 1,500 diesel locomotives, almost all purchased within the previous 10 years. Under the leadership of Downing B, Jenks, who became president and chief executive in 1961 the company became a pioneer in the early days of computer-guided rail technology. It was a major hauler of grain, TOFC, coal, ore, autos, at the time of their mega-merger in 1982 the MoPac owned newer locomotives, more locomotives and operated more track than partner Union Pacific Railroad. On December 1,1989, the Missouri Kansas Texas and the Galveston, Houston & Henderson were merged away into the Missouri Pacific after acquisition by the Union Pacific in 1988. By 1994 all motive power of the Missouri Pacific was repainted and on January 1,1997, its corporate, UP continued to use the MoPac headquarters building at 210 N. 13th St. in downtown St. Louis for its customer service center until February 15,2005. The former MoPac building has undergone rehab as apartments and is now known as Park Pacific, in this table MP includes New Orleans Texas & Mexico and all its subsidiary railroads that officially merged into MP in 1956. Ton-miles for C&EI in 1970 presumably dont include the L&N portion, by that same definition MP operated 10431 route-miles at the end of 1929, after A&G, SAS and Sugar Land had come under NOT&M, NO&LC operated 60 and DK&S operated 6. At the end of 1960 MP operated 9362 route-miles, NO&LC and DK&S were the same, T&P includes its subsidiary roads, operated route-miles totalled 2259 at the end of 1929 and 2033 at the end of 1960
11.
Union Pacific Railroad
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The Union Pacific Railroad is a freight hauling railroad that operates 8,500 locomotives over 32,100 route-miles in 23 states west of Chicago, Illinois and New Orleans, Louisiana. The Union Pacific Railroad network is the largest in the United States and it is also one of the worlds largest transportation companies. Union Pacific Railroad is the operating company of Union Pacific Corporation. Union Pacific Corporations main competitor is the BNSF Railway, the second largest freight railroad. Together, the two railroads have a duopoly on all freight rail lines in the U. S. The original company was incorporated on July 1,1862, under an act of Congress entitled Pacific Railroad Act of 1862. The act was approved by President Abraham Lincoln, and it provided for the construction of railroads from the Missouri River to the Pacific as a war measure for the preservation of the Union. It was constructed westward from Council Bluffs, Iowa to meet the Central Pacific Railroad line, the line was constructed primarily by Irish labor who had learned their craft during the recent Civil War. The two lines were joined together at Promontory Summit, Utah,53 miles west of Ogden on May 10,1869, hence creating the first transcontinental railroad in North America. Under the guidance of its dominant stockholder Dr. Thomas Clark Durant, the namesake of the city of Durant, Iowa, the first rails were laid in Omaha. It built or purchased local lines that gave it access to Denver, Colorado, to Portland, Oregon and it also owned narrow gauge trackage into the heart of the Colorado Rockies and a standard gauge line south from Denver across New Mexico into Texas. UP was entangled in the Crédit Mobilier scandal, exposed in 1872 and its independent construction company the Crédit Mobilier had bribed congressmen. The UP itself was not guilty but it did get bad publicity, the financial crisis of 1873 led to financial troubles but not bankruptcy. The company was reorganized as the Union Pacific Railway on January 24,1880, the new company declared bankruptcy during the Panic of 1893. When it emerged in 1897 it reverted to the original name, the corporate headquarters of the Union Pacific Corporation were located in New York City from its initial founding in the 1860s until Drew Lewis became CEO in the mid-1980s. He relocated it to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, later the headquarters was shifted to Dallas, Texas, before relocating to Omaha to join the operating headquarters. From the ICC annual reports, except 1979 is from Moodys, on December 31,1925 UP-OSL-OWRN-LA&SL-StJ&GI operated 9,834 route-miles and 15,265 track-miles. At the end of 1980, Union Pacific operated 9,266 route-miles and 15,647 miles of track, Moodys shows 220,697 million revenue ton-miles in 1993 on the expanded system
12.
Railroad
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Rail transport is a means of conveyance of passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, also known as tracks. It is also referred to as train transport. In contrast to road transport, where vehicles run on a flat surface. Tracks usually consist of rails, installed on ties and ballast, on which the rolling stock, usually fitted with metal wheels. Other variations are possible, such as slab track, where the rails are fastened to a concrete foundation resting on a prepared subsurface. Rolling stock in a transport system generally encounters lower frictional resistance than road vehicles, so passenger. The operation is carried out by a company, providing transport between train stations or freight customer facilities. Power is provided by locomotives which either draw electric power from a railway system or produce their own power. Most tracks are accompanied by a signalling system, Railways are a safe land transport system when compared to other forms of transport. The oldest, man-hauled railways date back to the 6th century BC, with Periander, one of the Seven Sages of Greece, Rail transport blossomed after the British development of the steam locomotive as a viable source of power in the 19th centuries. With steam engines, one could construct mainline railways, which were a key component of the Industrial Revolution, also, railways reduced the costs of shipping, and allowed for fewer lost goods, compared with water transport, which faced occasional sinking of ships. The change from canals to railways allowed for markets in which prices varied very little from city to city. In the 1880s, electrified trains were introduced, and also the first tramways, starting during the 1940s, the non-electrified railways in most countries had their steam locomotives replaced by diesel-electric locomotives, with the process being almost complete by 2000. During the 1960s, electrified high-speed railway systems were introduced in Japan, other forms of guided ground transport outside the traditional railway definitions, such as monorail or maglev, have been tried but have seen limited use. The history of the growth, decline and restoration to use of transport can be divided up into several discrete periods defined by the principal means of motive power used. The earliest evidence of a railway was a 6-kilometre Diolkos wagonway, trucks pushed by slaves ran in grooves in limestone, which provided the track element. The Diolkos operated for over 600 years, Railways began reappearing in Europe after the Dark Ages. The earliest known record of a railway in Europe from this period is a window in the Minster of Freiburg im Breisgau in Germany
13.
Parsons, Kansas
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Parsons is a city in Labette County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 10,500 and it is the most populous city of Labette County, and is the second most populous city in the southeastern region of Kansas. Parsons was named after Levi Parsons, president of the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad, the town was founded in 1870 and incorporated the following year. During World War II it was home to the Kansas Ordnance Plant, in Spring of 2005, the munitions plant was placed on the BRAC list for closure. The community has rallied behind the current plant operator, Day and Zimmerman, to keep the company on the grounds after closure and to keep those jobs and more in the Parsons area. Parsons is also home to the Parsons State Hospital & Training Center, in 1957 the hospital was renamed Parsons State Hospital and Training Center. At that time it began providing programs for individuals with developmental disabilities, the Hospital occupies 43 buildings on 163 acres. The first library began as a library in 1904 and was located in city hall. Parsons Public Library, a Carnegie library, opened on May 18,1909, a new library opened on April 18,1977, and its former building has since been renovated to become a visual and performing arts center. While, in return, the city received a million dollars to help it recover, that money is kept in a fund by the city government, which uses the accrued interest on economic development projects. The only reminder of the Katy Railroad is now found in the historical societys museum and of course the tracks. The Kansas Army Ammunition Plant also was down scaled in the 1980s, on April 19,2000, an F3 tornado cut a devastating path of destruction through the center of Parsons. Eight hundred homes, one hundred twenty businesses, and hundreds of vehicles were destroyed or damaged, the award was presented during the 2006 National Main Streets Conference in New Orleans. Parsons was one of five cities receiving the 2006 award. Parsons is the home of Dwaynes Photo, which became the last processor of K-14 Kodachrome film in the world and was the location of the final frame taken on the roll of Kodachrome film produced. The motion picture ZombieGeddon was filmed in Parsons in July 2002, Parsons is located at 37°20′21″N 95°16′11″W. The city is at the junction of U. S. Route 59, along US-59, the city of Erie is 17 miles to the north and Oswego is 20 miles south and east. Big Hill Lake is several miles to the west of the city, the Kansas Army Ammunition Plant is located southeast of the city
14.
Fort Scott, Kansas
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Fort Scott is a city in and the county seat of Bourbon County, Kansas,88 miles south of Kansas City, on the Marmaton River. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 8,087 and it is the home of the Fort Scott National Historic Site and the Fort Scott National Cemetery. Fort Scott is named for Gen. Winfield Scott, established and garrisoned by the U. S. Army from 1842–1853, soldiers at Fort Scott assisted with the protection of the Permanent Indian Frontier. After the army abandoned the fort in 1853, the buildings were purchased by settlers at a government auction in 1855. Fort Scott was laid out as a town in 1857, between 1855 and 1861, the citizens of Fort Scott experienced the violent unrest that preceded the American Civil War on the Kansas and Missouri border. Eastern newspapers described this violence as Bleeding Kansas, a result of the controversy concerning the extension of slavery into the new territories. Murder, rape, mayhem, robbery, and arson were committed by bold free-state, on January 29,1861, Kansas entered the union as a free state, but the turmoil of Bleeding Kansas continued throughout the Civil War. During the Civil War, Fort Scott was a U. S Army district Headquarters, quartermaster depot, training center. It was strategically vital to the defense of Kansas and the Midwest, a battle over the fort occurred in August 1861 just across the Missouri line in the Battle of Dry Wood Creek. The battle was a victory for Sterling Price and his Missouri State Guard. Price did not hold the fort and instead continued a northern push into Missouri in an attempt to recapture the state, james H. Lane was to launch a Jayhawker offensive behind Price from Fort Scott that led to the Sacking of Osceola. The ill will of these actions was to be the basis for the 1976 Clint Eastwood film The Outlaw Josey Wales, after the Civil War, Fort Scott was a premier city of the frontier, one of the largest cities in eastern Kansas. On three different occasions, between 1870 and 1900, Fort Scott was in competition with Kansas City to become the largest railroad center west of the Mississippi. During the first half of the 20th century, Fort Scott became an agricultural, on March 11,2005, a fire destroyed several historic buildings in Fort Scotts downtown. The Victorian-era buildings were among many that are a symbol of the town, Fort Scott is located at 37°50′7″N 94°42′7″W at an elevation of 846 feet. It lies on the Osage Plains on the side of the Marmaton River. Located at the intersection of U. S, routes 54 and 69 in southeast Kansas, Fort Scott is approximately 54 miles north of Joplin, Missouri,92 miles south of Kansas City, and 143 miles east of Wichita. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 5.59 square miles
15.
Junction City, Kansas
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Junction City is a city and county seat of Geary County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 23,353, Fort Riley, a major U. S. Army post, is nearby. Junction City is so named from its position at the confluence of the Smoky Hill, in 1854, Andrew J. Mead of New York of the Cincinnati-Manhattan Company, Free Staters connected to the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company planned a community there called Manhattan. The community was renamed Millard City for Captain Millard of the Hartford on October 3,1855 and it was renamed briefly Humboldt in 1857 by local farmers and renamed again later that year to Junction City. It was formally incorporated in 1859, in 1923, John R. Brinkley established Radio Station KFKB using a 1 kW transmitter. It is one of the not the very first—radio stations in Kansas. Brinkley used the station to espouse his belief that goat testicles could be implanted in men to enhance their virility, among its residents is film director Kevin Wilmott whose movies including Ninth Street are set in Junction City. Ninth Street specifically refers to an area of the community that was frequented by Fort Riley soldiers in the 1960s. In the 1980s a major initiative was undertaken to clean up the Ninth St. area, timothy McVeigh rented the Ryder truck he used in the Oklahoma City bombing from an auto body shop in Junction City. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 12.22 square miles. Over the course of a year, temperatures range from a low of about 15 °F in January to an average high of 90 °F in July. The maximum temperature reaches 90 °F an average of 47 days per year, the minimum temperature falls below the freezing point an average of 126 days per year. Typically the first fall freeze occurs during the month of October, the area receives over 32 inches of precipitation during an average year with the largest share being received during May, June, and July—with a combined 29 days of measurable precipitation. During a typical year the amount of precipitation may be anywhere from 23 to 43 inches. There are on average 86 days of precipitation per year. Winter snowfall averages less than 14 inches, but the median is just over 7 inches, measurable snowfall occurs an average of 6 days per year with at least an inch of snow being received on four of those days. Snow depth of at least an inch occurs an average of 17 days per year, as of the census of 2010, there were 23,353 people,9,134 households, and 6,109 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,922.1 inhabitants per square mile, there were 10,480 housing units at an average density of 862.6 per square mile
16.
Olathe, Kansas
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Olathe is a city in, and is the county seat of, Johnson County, Kansas, United States. Located in northeastern Kansas, it is also the fourth most populous city in the state, Olathe is also the fourth-largest city in the Kansas City metropolitan area. It is bordered by the cities of Lenexa to the north, Overland Park to the east, De Soto to the northwest, Olathe was founded by Dr. John T. Barton in the spring of 1857 and he rode to the center of Johnson County, Kansas, and staked two quarter sections of land as the town site. He later described his ride to friends. the prairie was covered with verbena, I kept thinking the land was beautiful and that I should name the town Beautiful. Purportedly, Barton asked a Shawnee interpreter how to say Beautiful in his native language, Olathe was incorporated as a city in 1857. While Olathe was not the first city established in Johnson County, the citys early days were filled with violence, as pro-slavery forces from nearby Missouri often clashed with local abolitionists. These conflicts were known on a scale as Bleeding Kansas. As the 1850s came to a close, and as Kansas entered the Union as a state in 1861. Quantrill launched the raid because the people of Olathe were known for their abolitionism, throughout the Civil War a military post operated in Olathe. The post probably was established in 1861 and was located on the square on which the Johnson County Courthouse has sat since that time. In March 1862 one company of troops were known to have been stationed there, when Quantrill raided Olathe on September 6,1862, more than 125 Union soldiers, almost all of them recruits, were there. They surrendered to Quantrill and were compelled to take an oath forbidding them from taking up arms against the Confederacy, Kansas militia occupied the Olathe military post through much of the Civil War and Army troops were there much of the time, as well. Twice more Olathe was threatened by Confederates, on August 20–21,1863, Quantrill again passed through the area when he raided Lawrence, Kansas. Many Union troops moved into and out of Olathe on those two days, the second time was on October 24-5,1864, when Confederate Maj. Gen. Sterling Price and a force of 10,000 men passed the area on their retreat south. The military post existed beyond the end of the Civil War, Olathe served as a stop on the Oregon Trail, the California Trail, and the Santa Fe Trail. Catering to travelers was the source of income for local stores and businesses. The Mahaffie House, a popular point for wagons headed westward, is today a registered historical site maintained by the City of Olathe
17.
Kansas City, Kansas
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Kansas City is the third-largest city in the state of Kansas, the county seat of Wyandotte County, and the third-largest city of the Kansas City metropolitan area. It is part of a consolidated city-county government known as the Unified Government, Wyandotte County also includes the independent cities of Bonner Springs and Edwardsville. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 145,786 residents and it is situated at Kaw Point, which is the junction of the Missouri and Kansas rivers. In October 1872, old Kansas City, Kansas, was incorporated, the first city election was held on October 22 of that year, by order of Judge Hiram Stevens of the Tenth Judicial District, and resulted in the election of Mayor James Boyle. The mayors of the city after its organization were James Boyle, C. A. Eidemiller, A. S. Orbison, Eli Teed, in June 1880, the Governor of Kansas proclaimed the city of Kansas City a city of the second class with Mayor McConnell present. In March 1886, new Kansas City, Kansas, was formed through the consolidation of five municipalities, old Kansas City, Armstrong, Armourdale, Riverview, the oldest city of the group was Wyandotte, which was formed in 1857 by Wyandot Native Americans and Methodist missionaries. In the 1890s, the city saw a growth in population as a streetcar suburb of Kansas City, Missouri, from which it takes its name. It was one of the nations 100 largest cities for many U. S. Census counts, from 1890 to 1960, including 1920, when it had a population of over 100,000 residents for the first time. As with adjacent Kansas City, Missouri, the percentage of the citys most populous ethnic group, in 1997, voters approved a proposition to unify the city and county governments creating the Unified Government of Wyandotte County. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 128.38 square miles. Neighborhoods of Kansas City, Kansas, include the following, Downtown Argentine − former home to the silver smelter for which it was named, Armourdale − formerly a city, it was consolidated with the city of Kansas City in 1886. Armstrong − a town absorbed by Wyandotte, bethel − a neighborhood located generally along Leavenworth Rd. between 72nd and 77th Streets. It was never incorporated as a municipality, Fairfax District − an industrial area along the Missouri River. Nearman Piper Pomeroy − a late-19th—early-20th-century Train Depot, Trading Post, Saw Mill, Riverview Rosedale − merged with Kansas City in 1922. Stony Point Strawberry Hill Turner − community around the Wyandotte-Johnson County border to the Kansas River north-south, unless otherwise stated, normal figures below are based on data from 1981 to 2010 at Downtown Airport. The warmest month of the year is July, with a 24-hour average temperature of 81.0 °F, the summer months are hot, but can get very hot and moderately humid, with moist air riding up from the Gulf of Mexico. High temperatures surpass 100 °F on 5.6 days of the year, the coldest month of the year is January, with an average temperature of 31.0 °F. Winters are cold, with 22 days where the high is at or below the mark and 2.5 nights with a low at or below 0 °F
18.
Kansas City, Missouri
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Kansas City is the largest city in Missouri and the sixth largest city in the Midwest. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the city had an population of 475,378 in 2015. It is the city of the Kansas City metropolitan area. Kansas City was founded in the 1830s as a Missouri River port at its confluence with the Kansas River coming in from the west, on June 1,1850 the town of Kansas was incorporated, shortly after came the establishment of the Kansas Territory. Confusion between the two ensued and the name Kansas City was assigned to them soon thereafter. Most of the city lies within Jackson County, but portions spill into Clay, Cass, along with Independence, it serves as one of the two county seats for Jackson County. Major suburbs include the Missouri cities of Independence and Lees Summit and the Kansas cities of Overland Park, Olathe, and Kansas City. The city is composed of neighborhoods, including the River Market District in the north, the 18th and Vine District in the east. Kansas City is also known for its cuisine, its craft breweries, Kansas City, Missouri was officially incorporated as a town on June 1,1850, and as a city on March 28,1853. The territory straddling the border between Missouri and Kansas at the confluence of the Kansas and Missouri rivers was considered a place to build settlements. The Antioch Christian Church, Dr. James Compton House, the first documented European visitor to Kansas City was Étienne de Veniard, Sieur de Bourgmont, who was also the first European to explore the lower Missouri River. Criticized for his response to the Native American attack on Fort Détroit, Bourgmont lived with a Native American wife in a village about 90 miles east near Brunswick, Missouri, where he illegally traded furs. In the documents, he describes the junction of the Grande Riv des Cansez and Missouri River, French cartographer Guillaume Delisle used the descriptions to make the areas first reasonably accurate map. The Spanish took over the region in the Treaty of Paris in 1763, the French continued their fur trade under Spanish license. After the 1804 Louisiana Purchase, Lewis and Clark visited the confluence of the Kansas and Missouri rivers, in 1831, a group of Mormons from New York settled in what would become the city. They built the first school within Kansas Citys current boundaries, but were forced out by mob violence in 1833, in 1833 John McCoy established West Port along the Santa Fe Trail,3 miles away from the river. In 1834 McCoy established Westport Landing on a bend in the Missouri to serve as a point for West Port. Soon after, the Kansas Town Company, a group of investors, began to settle the area, in 1850, the landing area was incorporated as the Town of Kansas
19.
Joplin, Missouri
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Joplin or is a city in southern Jasper County and northern Newton County in the southwestern corner of the U. S. state of Missouri. Joplin is the largest city in Jasper County, though it is not the county seat, as of the 2010 census, the city population was 50,150. Joplin is the hub of the three-county Joplin-Miami, Oklahoma metropolitan area. Lead was discovered in the Joplin Creek Valley before the Civil War, by 1871, numerous mining camps sprang up in the valley and resident John C. Cox filed a plan for a city on the east side of the valley. Cox named his village Joplin City after the spring and creek nearby, which had named for the Reverend Harris G. Joplin. Carthage resident Patrick Murphy filed a plan for a city on the side of the valley. While the nearest sheriff was in Carthage, frontier lawlessness abounded in Joplin, the historic period was referred to as the Reign of Terror. The cities eventually merged into Union City, but when the merger was found illegal, Murphy suggested that a combined city be named Joplin. The cities merged again on March 23,1873, this time permanently, while Joplin was first settled for lead mining, zinc, often referred to as jack, was the most important mineral resource. As railroads were built to connect Joplin to major markets in other cities, by the start of the twentieth century, the city was becoming a regional metropolis. Construction centered around Main Street, with bars, hotels. Joplins three-story House of Lords was its most famous saloon, with a bar and restaurant on the first floor, gambling on the second, Trolley and rail lines made Joplin the hub of southwest Missouri. As the center of the Tri-state district, it became the lead-. As a result of surface and deep mining, Joplin is dotted with open-pit mines. Mining left many tailings piles, which are considered unsightly locally, the open-pit mines pose hazards, but some find them to have a kind of beauty, as well. The main part of Joplin is nearly 75% undermined, with mine shafts well over 100 ft deep. These mine shafts have occasionally caved in, creating sinkholes, the mining history and geology are well documented in the mineral museum in town. Joplin began to add cultural amenities, in 1902, residents passed a tax to create a public library and it was seen as the symbol of a thriving city
20.
Columbia, Missouri
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Columbia /kəˈlʌmbiə/ is a city in the U. S. state of Missouri and the county seat of Boone County. Founded in 1818, it is home to the University of Missouri and is the city of the Columbia Metropolitan Area. It is Missouris fourth most-populous city, with a population of 119,108 in 2015. As a midwestern town, the city has a reputation for progressive politics, public art. At the center of Downtown is 8th Street, also known as the Avenue of the Columns, which connects Francis Quadrangle and Jesse Hall to the Boone County Courthouse, originally an agricultural town, the cultivation of the mind is Columbias chief economic concern today. Never a major center of manufacturing, the city depends on healthcare, insurance. Several companies, such as Shelter Insurance, Carfax, and Slackers CDs, cultural institutions include the State Historical Society of Missouri, the Museum of Art and Archaeology, and the annual True/False Film Festival. The Missouri Tigers, the only major college athletic program, play football at Faurot Field. The city is built upon the hills and rolling prairies of Mid-Missouri, near the Missouri River valley. Limestone forms bluffs and glades while rain carves caves and springs which water the Hinkson, Roche Perche, surrounding the city, Rock Bridge Memorial State Park, Mark Twain National Forest, and Big Muddy National Fish and Wildlife Refuge all form a greenbelt preserving sensitive and rare environments. The first humans were hunters who entered the area at least twelve thousand years ago. Later, woodland tribes lived in villages along waterways and built mounds in high places, the Osage and Missouria nations were expelled by the exploration of French traders and the rapid settlement of American pioneers. German, Irish, and other European immigrants soon joined, the modern populace is unusually diverse, over eight percent foreign-born. While White and Black remain the largest ethnicities, Asians are now the third-largest group, todays Columbians are remarkably highly educated and culturally midwestern, though traces of their Southern past remain. The city has called the Athens of Missouri for its classic beauty and educational emphasis. The Columbia area was part of the Mississippian culture and home to the Mound Builders. When European explorers arrived, the area was populated by the Osage, in 1678, La Salle claimed all of Missouri for France. The Lewis and Clark Expedition passed by the area on the Missouri River in early June 1804, in 1806, two sons of Daniel Boone established a salt lick 40 miles northwest of Columbia
21.
Jefferson City, Missouri
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Jefferson City is the capital of the State of Missouri and the fifteenth most populous city in the state. It is also the county seat of Cole County and the city of the Jefferson City Metropolitan Statistical Area. Jefferson City is named for Thomas Jefferson, the president of the United States. Jefferson City currently holds the title of Americas Most Beautiful Small Town, Jefferson City is on the northern edge of the Ozark Plateau on the southern side of the Missouri River in a region known as Mid-Missouri. It is also at the edge of one of the major wine-producing regions of the Midwest. Often referred to as Jeff, many of Jefferson Citys primary employers fall within the service and manufacturing industries, Jefferson City is also home to Lincoln University, a public historically black land-grant university founded in 1866 by the 62nd Regiment of U. S. Colored Troops with additional support from the 65th Regiment of U. S, in pre-Columbian times, this region was home of an ancient people known only as the Mound Builders. They were no longer present by the time of the first white settlers, when the Missouri Territory was organized in 1812, St. Louis was Missouris seat of government, and St. Charles would serve as the next capital. In the middle of the state, Jefferson City was chosen as the new capital in 1821 when Thomas Jefferson was still living, the village first was called Lohmans Landing, and when the legislature decided to relocate there, they proposed the name Missouriopolis before settling on Jefferson City. For years, this village was more than a trading post located in the wilderness about midway between St. Louis and Kansas City. In 1825, the settlement was incorporated as a city and a year later, Jefferson City was chosen as the site of a state prison. This prison, named the Missouri State Penitentiary, opened in 1836 and this prison was home to multiple infamous Americans, including former heavyweight champion Sonny Liston, assassin James Earl Ray, and bank robber Charles Pretty Boy Floyd. During the Civil War, Jefferson City was occupied by Union troops, some of the legislators later reconvened in Neosho, Missouri and passed an ordinance of secession. Missouri was claimed by both the Confederacy and the Union, just like the neighboring state Kentucky, German immigrants created vineyards in small towns on either side of the Missouri River, especially on the north from the city east to Marthasville, located outside of St. Louis. Known as the Missouri Rhineland for its vineyards and first established by German immigrants in the mid-1800s, this region has become part of the agricultural and tourist economy. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 37.58 square miles. Jefferson City has a climate between a humid subtropical and humid continental climate with hot, rainy summers and cold winters. Thunderstorms are common in both the spring and summer, light snow is common during the winter, although about half of wintertime precipitation falls as rain
22.
St. Louis, Missouri
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St. Louis is an independent city and major U. S. port in the state of Missouri, built along the western bank of the Mississippi River, on the border with Illinois. Prior to European settlement, the area was a regional center of Native American Mississippian culture. The city of St. Louis was founded in 1764 by French fur traders Pierre Laclède and Auguste Chouteau, in 1764, following Frances defeat in the Seven Years War, the area was ceded to Spain and retroceded back to France in 1800. In 1803, the United States acquired the territory as part of the Louisiana Purchase, during the 19th century, St. Louis developed as a major port on the Mississippi River. In the 1870 Census, St. Louis was ranked as the 4th-largest city in the United States and it separated from St. Louis County in 1877, becoming an independent city and limiting its own political boundaries. In 1904, it hosted the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and the Summer Olympics, the economy of metro St. Louis relies on service, manufacturing, trade, transportation of goods, and tourism. This city has become known for its growing medical, pharmaceutical. St. Louis has 2 professional sports teams, the St. Louis Cardinals of Major League Baseball, the city is commonly identified with the 630-foot tall Gateway Arch in Downtown St. Louis. The area that would become St. Louis was a center of the Native American Mississippian culture and their major regional center was at Cahokia Mounds, active from 900 AD to 1500 AD. Due to numerous major earthworks within St. Louis boundaries, the city was nicknamed as the Mound City and these mounds were mostly demolished during the citys development. Historic Native American tribes in the area included the Siouan-speaking Osage people, whose territory extended west, European exploration of the area was first recorded in 1673, when French explorers Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette traveled through the Mississippi River valley. Five years later, La Salle claimed the region for France as part of La Louisiane. The earliest European settlements in the area were built in Illinois Country on the east side of the Mississippi River during the 1690s and early 1700s at Cahokia, Kaskaskia, migrants from the French villages on the opposite side of the Mississippi River founded Ste. In early 1764, after France lost the 7 Years War, Pierre Laclède, the early French families built the citys economy on the fur trade with the Osage, as well as with more distant tribes along the Missouri River. The Chouteau brothers gained a monopoly from Spain on the fur trade with Santa Fe, French colonists used African slaves as domestic servants and workers in the city. In 1780 during the American Revolutionary War, St. Louis was attacked by British forces, mostly Native American allies, the founding of St. Louis began in 1763. Pierre Laclede led an expedition to set up a fur-trading post farther up the Mississippi River, before then, Laclede had been a very successful merchant. For this reason, he and his trading partner Gilbert Antoine de St. Maxent were offered monopolies for six years of the fur trading in that area
23.
Tulsa, Oklahoma
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Tulsa /ˈtʌlsə/ is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. As of July 2015, the population was 403,505 and it is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with 981,005 residents in the MSA and 1,151,172 in the CSA. The city serves as the county seat of Tulsa County, the most densely populated county in Oklahoma, with urban development extending into Osage, Rogers, Tulsa was settled between 1828 and 1836 by the Lochapoka Band of Creek Native American tribe. For most of the 20th century, the city held the nickname Oil Capital of the World, once heavily dependent on the oil industry, Tulsa experienced economic downturn. Subsequent diversification efforts created a base in the energy, finance, aviation, telecommunications. The Tulsa Port of Catoosa, at the head of the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, is the most inland port in the U. S. with access to international waterways. Two institutions of education within the city have sports teams at the NCAA Division I level, Oral Roberts University. It is situated on the Arkansas River at the foothills of the Ozark Mountains in northeast Oklahoma, the city has been called one of Americas most livable large cities by Partners for Livable Communities, Forbes, and Relocate America. FDi Magazine in 2009 ranked the city no.8 in the U. S. for cities of the future, in 2012, Tulsa was ranked among the top 50 best cities in the United States by BusinessWeek. People from Tulsa are called Tulsans, the area where Tulsa now exists was considered Indian Territory when it was first formally settled by the Lochapoka and Creek tribes in 1836. They established a settlement under the Creek Council Oak Tree at the present day intersection of Cheyenne Avenue. This area and this tree reminded Chief Tukabahchi and his group of trail of tear survivors of the bend in the river and their previous Creek Council Oak Tree back in the Talisi. They named their new settlement Tallasi, meaning old town in the Creek language, the area around Tulsa was also settled by members of the other so-called Five Civilized Tribes who had relocated to Oklahoma from the Southern United States. Most of modern Tulsa is located in the Creek Nation, with parts located in the Cherokee Nation, although Oklahoma was not yet a state during the Civil War, the Tulsa area did see its share of fighting. The Battle of Chusto-Talasah took place on the side of Tulsa. After the War, the tribes signed Reconstruction treaties with the government that in some cases required substantial land concessions. On January 18,1898, Tulsa was officially incorporated and elected its first mayor, Tulsa was a small town near the banks of the Arkansas River in 1901 when its first oil well, named Sue Bland No. Much of the oil was discovered on land whose mineral rights were owned by members of the Osage Nation under a system of headrights
24.
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
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Oklahoma City is the capital and largest city of the U. S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 27th among United States cities in population, the population grew following the 2010 Census, with the population estimated to have increased to 631,346 as of July 2015. Oklahoma Citys city limits extend into Canadian, Cleveland, and Pottawatomie counties, the city ranks as the eighth-largest city in the United States by land area. Oklahoma City has the largest municipal population of any city in the Great Plains region of the central United States as well as all neighboring states to Oklahoma, excluding Texas, lying in the Great Plains region, Oklahoma City features one of the largest livestock markets in the world. Oil, natural gas, petroleum products and related industries are the largest sector of the local economy, the city is situated in the middle of an active oil field and oil derricks dot the capitol grounds. The federal government employs large numbers of workers at Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma City is on the I-35 Corridor, which is one of the primary travel corridors south into neighboring Texas and Mexico and north towards Wichita and Kansas City. Located in the Frontier Country region of the state, the citys northeast section lies in a region known as the Cross Timbers. The city was founded during the Land Run of 1889, the city was the scene of the April 19,1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, in which 168 people died. It was the deadliest terror attack in the history of the United States until the attacks of September 11,2001, and remains the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U. S. history. Oklahoma City was settled on April 22,1889, when the known as the Unassigned Lands was opened for settlement in an event known as The Land Run. Some 10,000 homesteaders settled the area that would become the capital of Oklahoma, the town grew quickly, the population doubled between 1890 and 1900. Early leaders of the development of the city included Anton Classen, John Shartel, Henry Overholser, by the time Oklahoma was admitted to the Union in 1907, Oklahoma City had surpassed Guthrie, the territorial capital, as the population center and commercial hub of the new state. Soon after, the capital was moved from Guthrie to Oklahoma City, before World War II, Oklahoma City developed major stockyards, attracting jobs and revenue formerly in Chicago and Omaha, Nebraska. With the 1928 discovery of oil within the city limits, Oklahoma City became a center of oil production. Post-war growth accompanied the construction of the Interstate Highway System, which made Oklahoma City a major interchange as the convergence of I-35, I-40 and it was also aided by federal development of Tinker Air Force Base. In 1950, the Census Bureau reported citys population as 8. 6% black and 90. 7% white, patience Latting was elected Mayor of Oklahoma City in 1971, becoming the citys first female mayor. Latting was also the first woman to serve as mayor of a U. S. city with over 350,000 residents. As with many other American cities, center city population declined in the 1970s and 1980s as families followed newly constructed highways to move to housing in nearby suburbs
25.
Dallas, Texas
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Dallas is a major city in the U. S. state of Texas. It is the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the citys population ranks ninth in the U. S. and third in Texas after Houston and San Antonio. The citys prominence arose from its importance as a center for the oil and cotton industries. The bulk of the city is in Dallas County, of which it is the county seat, however, sections of the city are located in Collin, Denton, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties. According to the 2010 United States Census, the city had a population of 1,197,816, the United States Census Bureaus estimate for the citys population increased to 1,300,092 as of July 1,2015. In 2016 DFW ascended to the one spot in the nation in year-over-year population growth. In 2014, the metropolitan economy surpassed Washington, D. C. to become the fifth largest in the U. S. with a 2014 real GDP over $504 billion, as such, the metropolitan areas economy is the 10th largest in the world. As of January 2017, the job count has increased to 3,558,200 jobs. The citys economy is based on banking, commerce, telecommunications, technology, energy, healthcare and medical research. The city is home to the third-largest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the nation. Located in North Texas, Dallas is the core of the largest metropolitan area in the South. Dallas and nearby Fort Worth were developed due to the construction of railroad lines through the area allowing access to cotton, cattle. Later, France also claimed the area but never established much settlement, the area remained under Spanish rule until 1821, when Mexico declared independence from Spain, and the area was considered part of the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. In 1836, the Republic of Texas, with majority Anglo-American settlers, in 1839, Warren Angus Ferris surveyed the area around present-day Dallas. John Neely Bryan established a permanent settlement near the Trinity River named Dallas in 1841, the origin of the name is uncertain. The Republic of Texas was annexed by the United States in 1845, Dallas was formally incorporated as a city on February 2,1856. With construction of railroads, Dallas became a business and trading center and it became an industrial city, attracting workers from Texas, the South and the Midwest. The Praetorian Building of 15 stories, built in 1909, was the first skyscraper west of the Mississippi and it marked the prominence of Dallas as a city
26.
Fort Worth, Texas
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Fort Worth is the 16th-largest city in the United States and the fifth-largest city in the state of Texas. The city is in North Central Texas and covers nearly 350 square miles in the counties of Denton, Parker, Wise, according to the 2015 census, estimates, Fort Worths population is 833,319. The city is the second-largest in the Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington metropolitan area, the city was established in 1849 as an Army outpost on a bluff overlooking the Trinity River. Today, Fort Worth still embraces its Western heritage and traditional architecture, USS Fort Worth is the first ship of the United States Navy named after the city. Fort Worth is home to the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, also of note is the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, designed by Tadao Ando. The Amon Carter Museum of American Art, designed by Philip Johnson, the Sid Richardson Museum, redesigned by David M. Schwarz, has one of the most focused collections of Western Art in the U. S. emphasizing Frederic Remington and Charles Russell. The Treaty of Birds Fort between the Republic of Texas and several Native American tribes was signed in 1843 at Birds Fort in present-day Arlington, Texas. Article XI of the treaty provided that no one may pass the line of trading houses without permission of the President of Texas and these trading houses were later established at the junction of the Clear Fork and West Fork of the Trinity River in present-day Fort Worth. At this river junction, the U. S, War Department established Fort Worth in 1849 as the northernmost of a system of 10 forts for protecting the American Frontier following the end of the Mexican–American War. The City of Fort Worth continues to be known as where the West begins, originally 10 forts had been proposed by Major General William Jenkins Worth, who commanded the Department of Texas in 1849. In January 1849, Worth proposed a line of 10 forts to mark the western Texas frontier from Eagle Pass to the confluence of the West Fork, One month later, Worth died from cholera in South Texas. General William S. Harney assumed command of the Department of Texas, Arnold to find a new fort site near the West Fork and Clear Fork. On June 6,1849, Arnold, advised by Middleton Tate Johnson, established a camp on the bank of the Trinity River, in August 1849, Arnold moved the camp to the north-facing bluff, which overlooked the mouth of the Clear Fork of the Trinity River. The United States War Department officially named the post Fort Worth on November 14,1849, E. S. Terrell from Tennessee claimed to be the first resident of Fort Worth. The fort was flooded the first year and moved to the top of the bluff, the fort was abandoned September 17,1853. As a stop on the legendary Chisholm Trail, Fort Worth was stimulated by the business of the cattle drives, millions of head of cattle were driven north to market along this trail. Fort Worth became the center of the drives, and later. It was given the nickname of Cowtown, during Civil War, Fort Worth suffered from shortages of money, food, and supplies
27.
Waco, Texas
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Waco is a city which is the county seat of McLennan County, Texas, United States. It is situated along the Brazos River and I-35, halfway between Dallas and Austin, the city had a 2010 population of 124,805, making it the 22nd-most populous city in the state. The US Census 2015 population estimate is 132,356, the Waco Metropolitan Statistical Area consists of McLennan and Falls Counties, which had a 2010 population of 234,906. Falls County was added to the Waco MSA in 2013, the US Census 2016 population estimate for the Waco MSA is 265,207. Indigenous peoples occupied areas along the river for thousands of years, in historic times, the area of present-day Waco was occupied by the Wichita Native American tribe known as the Waco. In 1824, Thomas M. Duke explored the area and reported to Stephen F. Austin, describing the Waco village and they have a spring almost as cold as ice itself. All we want is some Brandy and Sugar to have Ice Toddy and they have about 400 acres planted in corn, beans, pumpkins, and melons and that tended in good order. I think they cannot raise more than One Hundred Warriors, after Austin halted the first attempt to destroy their village in 1825, he made a treaty with them. The Waco eventually moved out of the region, settling north near present-day Fort Worth, in 1872, they joined other Wichita tribes on a reservation in Oklahoma. In 1902, the Waco received allotments of land and became official US citizens, neil McLennan settled in an area near the South Bosque River in 1838. Jacob De Cordova bought McLennans property and hired a former Texas Ranger, in 1849, Erath designed the first block of the city. Property owners wanted to name the city Lamartine, but Erath convinced them to name the area Waco Village, in March 1849, Shapley Ross built the first house in Waco, a double-log cabin, on a bluff overlooking the springs. His daughter Kate was the first white child to be born in Waco, in 1866, Wacos leading citizens embarked on an ambitious project to build the first bridge to span the wide Brazos River. They formed the Waco Bridge Company to build the 475-foot brick Waco Suspension Bridge, the economic effects of the Waco bridge were immediate and large. The cowboys and cattle-herds following the Chisholm Trail north, crossed the Brazos River at Waco, some chose to pay the Suspension Bridge toll, while others floated their herds down the river. The population of Waco grew rapidly, as immigrants now had a crossing for their horse-drawn carriages. Since 1971, the bridge has been only to pedestrian traffic and is in the National Register of Historic Places. In the late 19th century, a district called the Reservation grew up in Waco
28.
Temple, Texas
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Temple is a city in Bell County, Texas, United States. As of 2016 the city has a population of 72,277 according to a US census estimate, located near the county seat of Belton, Temple lies in the region referred to as Central Texas and is a principal city in the Killeen–Temple–Fort Hood Metropolitan Statistical Area. The metro region has a population of 450,051, located off Interstate 35, Temple is 65 miles north of Austin and 34 miles south of Waco. Temple has developed as a city with a number of arts. The primary economic drivers are the medical community and goods distribution based on its central location and proximity to larger cities, such as Austin. Temple was founded as a town in 1881, by the Gulf, Colorado. The town was named after a Santa Fe Railroad official, Bernard Moore Temple, Temple was a civil engineer and former surveyor with the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway Company. In 1882, the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad built through the town, and soon after, in its early years, Temple was a town of shacks and tents with a large number of saloons and tough characters found in the early West. Locally, it was nicknamed Tanglefoot, because some citizens found that the combination of muddy streets, after the town was incorporated in 1882, two private schools were founded in the city, the Temple Academy was organized and public school was established in 1884. In 1893, the annual Temple Stag Party began, growing out of a private Thanksgiving celebration attended by the leading men. The Temple Railroad and Heritage Museum, on the floor of the Santa Fe Railroad station at 315 West Avenue B. Temple is located northeast of the center of Bell County at 31°6′30″N 97°23′21″W and it is the second largest city in Bell County. It is bordered to the southwest, on the side of the Leon River, by Belton. The city is located right on Interstate 35 running alongside the Balcones Fault with very mixed geography, towards the east lies the Blackland Prairie region, and towards the west the terrain rises with low rolling limestone layered hills at the northeastern tip of the Texas Hill Country. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 74.9 square miles. As of the 2010 census, there were 66,102 people,23,359 households, the population density was 834.2 people per square mile. There were 28,005 housing units at a density of 359.8 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 68. 1% White,23. 7% Hispanic or Latino,16. 9% African American,0. 6% Native American,2. 1% Asian,0. 1% Pacific Islander, and 3. 3% from two or more races
29.
Austin, Texas
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Austin is the capital of the U. S. state of Texas and the seat of Travis County. It is the 11th-most populous city in the U. S. and it is the fastest growing large city in the United States and the second most populous capital city after Phoenix, Arizona. As of the U. S. Census Bureaus July 1,2015 estimate and it is the cultural and economic center of the Austin–Round Rock metropolitan area, which had an estimated population of 2,056,405 as of July 1,2016. In the 1830s, pioneers began to settle the area in central Austin along the Colorado River, in 1839, the site was officially chosen to replace Houston as the new capital of the Republic of Texas and was incorporated under the name Waterloo. Shortly thereafter, the name was changed to Austin in honor of Stephen F. Austin, the Father of Texas and the republics first secretary of state. The city subsequently grew throughout the 19th century and became a center for government and education with the construction of the Texas State Capitol and the University of Texas at Austin. After a lull in growth from the Great Depression, Austin resumed its development into a city and, by the 1980s, it emerged as a center for technology. A number of Fortune 500 companies have headquarters or regional offices in Austin, including Amazon. com, cisco, eBay, Google, IBM, Intel, Oracle Corporation, Texas Instruments, 3M, and Whole Foods Market. Dells worldwide headquarters is located in nearby Round Rock, a suburb of Austin, residents of Austin are known as Austinites. They include a mix of government employees, college students, musicians, high-tech workers, blue-collar workers. The city also adopted Silicon Hills as a nickname in the 1990s due to an influx of technology. In the late 1800s, Austin was known as the City of the Violet Crown because of the glow of light across the hills just after sunset. Even today, many Austin businesses use the term Violet Crown in their name, Austin is known as a clean-air city for its stringent no-smoking ordinances that apply to all public places and buildings, including restaurants and bars. The FBI ranked Austin as the second-safest major city in the U. S. for the year 2012, U. S. News & World Report named Austin the best place to live in the U. S. in 2017. Austin, Travis County and Williamson County have been the site of habitation since at least 9200 BC. When settlers arrived from Europe, the Tonkawa tribe inhabited the area, the Comanches and Lipan Apaches were also known to travel through the area. Spanish colonists, including the Espinosa-Olivares-Aguirre expedition, traveled through the area for centuries, in 1730, three missions from East Texas were combined and reestablished as one mission on the south side of the Colorado River, in what is now Zilker Park, in Austin. The mission was in area for only about seven months
30.
San Antonio, Texas
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San Antonio, officially the City of San Antonio, is the seventh-most populated city in the United States and the second-most populous city in the state of Texas, with a population of 1,409,019. It was the fastest growing of the top 10 largest cities in the United States from 2000 to 2010, the city straddles South Texas and Central Texas and is on the southwestern corner of an urban megaregion known as the Texas Triangle. San Antonio serves as the seat of Bexar County, recent annexations have extended the citys boundaries into Medina County and, though for only a very tiny area near the city of Garden Ridge, into Comal County. Due to its placement, the city has characteristics of other urban centers in which there are sparsely populated areas. San Antonio is the center of the San Antonio–New Braunfels Metropolitan Statistical Area, growth along the Interstate 35 and Interstate 10 corridors to the north, west and east make it likely that the metropolitan area will continue to expand. San Antonio was named for Saint Anthony of Padua, whose feast day is on June 13, the city contains five 18th-century Spanish frontier missions, including The Alamo and San Antonio Missions National Historical Park, which were designated UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 2015. Other notable attractions include the River Walk, the Tower of the Americas, the Alamo Bowl, the city is home to the five-time NBA champion San Antonio Spurs and hosts the annual San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo, one of the largest such events in the country. The U. S. Kelly Air Force Base operated out of San Antonio until 2001, the remaining portions of the base were developed as Port San Antonio, an industrial/business park and aerospace complex. San Antonio is home to six Fortune 500 companies and the South Texas Medical Center, at the time of European encounter, Payaya Indians lived near the San Antonio River Valley in the San Pedro Springs area, calling the vicinity Yanaguana, meaning refreshing waters. In 1691, a group of Spanish Catholic explorers and missionaries came upon the river and Payaya settlement on June 13 and they named the place and river San Antonio in his honor. It was years before any Spanish settlement took place, father Antonio de Olivares visited the site in 1709, and he was determined to found a mission and civilian settlement there. He directed Martin de Alarcón, the governor of Coahuila and Texas, differences between Alarcón and Olivares resulted in delays, and construction did not start until 1718. The families who clustered around the presidio and mission formed the beginnings of Villa de Béjar, on May 1, the governor transferred ownership of the Mission San Antonio de Valero to Fray Antonio de Olivares. On May 5,1718 he commissioned the Presidio San Antonio de Béxar on the west side of the San Antonio River, one-fourth league from the mission. On February 14,1719, the Marquis of San Miguel de Aguayo proposed to the king of Spain that 400 families be transported from the Canary Islands, Galicia, or Havana to populate the province of Texas. By June 1730,25 families had reached Cuba, and 10 families had sent to Veracruz before orders from Spain came to stop the re-settlement. Under the leadership of Juan Leal Goraz, the group marched overland from Veracruz to the Presidio San Antonio de Béxar, due to marriages along the way, the party now included 15 families, a total of 56 persons. They joined the community established in 1718
31.
Houston, Texas
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Houston is the most populous city in the state of Texas and the fourth-most populous city in the United States. With a census-estimated 2014 population of 2.239 million within an area of 667 square miles, it also is the largest city in the southern United States and the seat of Harris County. Located in Southeast Texas near the Gulf of Mexico, it is the city of Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land. Houston was founded on August 28,1836, near the banks of Buffalo Bayou and incorporated as a city on June 5,1837. The city was named after former General Sam Houston, who was president of the Republic of Texas and had commanded, the burgeoning port and railroad industry, combined with oil discovery in 1901, has induced continual surges in the citys population. Houstons economy has an industrial base in energy, manufacturing, aeronautics. Leading in health care sectors and building equipment, Houston has more Fortune 500 headquarters within its city limits than any city except for New York City. The Port of Houston ranks first in the United States in international waterborne tonnage handled, the city has a population from various ethnic and religious backgrounds and a large and growing international community. Houston is the most diverse city in Texas and has described as the most diverse in the United States. It is home to cultural institutions and exhibits, which attract more than 7 million visitors a year to the Museum District. Houston has a visual and performing arts scene in the Theater District. In August 1836, two real estate entrepreneurs from New York, Augustus Chapman Allen and John Kirby Allen, purchased 6,642 acres of land along Buffalo Bayou with the intent of founding a city. The Allen brothers decided to name the city after Sam Houston, the general at the Battle of San Jacinto. The great majority of slaves in Texas came with their owners from the slave states. Sizable numbers, however, came through the slave trade. New Orleans was the center of trade in the Deep South. Thousands of enslaved African Americans lived near the city before the Civil War, many of them near the city worked on sugar and cotton plantations, while most of those in the city limits had domestic and artisan jobs. Houston was granted incorporation on June 5,1837, with James S. Holman becoming its first mayor, in the same year, Houston became the county seat of Harrisburg County and the temporary capital of the Republic of Texas
32.
Galveston, Texas
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Galveston is a coastal resort city on Galveston Island and Pelican Island in the U. S. state of Texas. The community of 209.3 square miles, with a population of 50,180 in 2015, is the county seat. It is within Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land metropolitan area, the Port of Galveston was established in 1825 by the Congress of Mexico following its independence from Spain. The city was the port for the Texas Navy during the Texas Revolution. During the 19th century, Galveston became a major U. S. commercial center and it was devastated by the 1900 Galveston Hurricane, whose effects included flooding and a storm surge. The natural disaster on the barrier island is still ranked as the deadliest in United States history. Much of Galvestons economy is centered in the tourism, health care, shipping, the 84-acre University of Texas Medical Branch campus with an enrollment of more than 2,500 students is a major economic force of the city. Galveston Island was originally inhabited by members of the Karankawa and Akokisa tribes who called the island Auia, the Spanish explorer Cabeza de Vaca and his crew were shipwrecked on the island or nearby in November 1528, calling it Isla de Malhado. They began their trek to a Spanish settlement in Mexico City. During his charting of the Gulf Coast in 1785, the Spanish explorer José de Evia named the island Villa Gálvez or Gálveztown in honor of Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez. The islands first permanent European settlements were constructed around 1816 by the pirate Louis-Michel Aury to support Mexicos rebellion against Spain, in 1817, Aury returned from an unsuccessful raid against Spain to find Galveston occupied by the pirate Jean Lafitte. Lafitte organized Galveston into a kingdom he called Campeche, anointing himself the islands head of government. Lafitte remained in Galveston until 1821, when the United States Navy forced him, in 1825 the Congress of Mexico established the Port of Galveston and in 1830 erected a customs house. Galveston served as the capital of the Republic of Texas when in 1836 the interim president David G. Burnet relocated his government there. In 1836, the French-Canadian Michel Branamour Menard and several associates purchased 4,605 acres of land for $50,000 to found the town that would become the city of Galveston. As Anglo-Americans migrated to the city, they brought along or purchased enslaved African-Americans, some of whom worked domestically or on the waterfront, in 1839, the City of Galveston adopted a charter and was incorporated by the Congress of the Republic of Texas. The city was by then a port of entry and attracted many new residents in the 1840s and later among the flood of German immigrants to Texas. Together with ethnic Mexican residents, these tended to oppose slavery, support the Union during the Civil War
33.
Salina, Kansas
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Salina /səˈlaɪnə/ is a city in and the county seat of Saline County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 47,707, located in one of the worlds largest wheat-producing areas, Salina, is a regional trade center for north-central Kansas. It is home to multiple colleges, prior to European colonization of the area, the site of Salina was located within the territory of the Kansa people. Claimed first by France as part of Louisiana and later acquired by the United States with the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, in 1856, a colony led by Preston B. Plumb established the first American settlement near the site at a location on the Saline River, settlers led by journalist and lawyer William A. Phillips founded Salina in 1858. During the following two years, the legislature chartered the town company, organized the surrounding area as Saline County. The westernmost town on the Smoky Hill Trail, Salina established itself as a trading post for westbound immigrants, prospectors bound for Pikes Peak, and area American Indian tribes. The towns growth halted with the outbreak of the American Civil War when much of the population left to join the U. S. Army. In 1862, local residents fended off American Indian raiders only to fall victim to an assault by bushwhackers later that year. In May and June 1864, the Salina Stockade was built to protect the town against further Indian raids, troops were garrisoned in Salina until March 1865, and some may have returned in June 1865. The stockade was used until at least spring or summer 1865. Growth returned with the soldiers after the war, and the town expanded rapidly with the arrival of the Kansas Pacific Railway in 1867, Salina incorporated as a city in 1870. The cattle trade arrived in 1872, transforming Salina into a cowtown, the trade brought the city further prosperity, but also a rowdy culture that agitated local residents. The cattle trade relocated westward just two years later, during the 1870s, wheat became the dominant crop in the area, steam-powered flour mills were built, and agriculture became the engine of the local economy. In 1874, Salina resident E. R. Switzer introduced alfalfa to area farmers, by 1880, the city was an area industrial center with several mills, a carriage and wagon factory, and a farm implement works. Salina was the location of the first garment factory of jeans maker Lee, over the following decade, three railroads were built through the city. In 1943, the U. S. Army established Smoky Hill Army Airfield southwest of the city, the installation served as a base for strategic bomber units throughout World War II. Renamed Smoky Hill Air Force Base in 1948, the base closed the year only to be reopened in 1951 as Schilling Air Force Base
34.
Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad
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The Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad was a Class I railroad in the United States. It was also known as the Rock Island Line, or, in its final years, at the end of 1970 it operated 7183 miles of road on 10669 miles of track, that year it reported 20557 million ton-miles of revenue freight and 118 million passenger-miles. The song Rock Island Line, a spiritual from the late 1920s first recorded in 1934, was inspired by the railway, construction began October 1,1851, in Chicago, and the first train was operated on October 10,1852, between Chicago and Joliet. Construction continued on through La Salle, and Rock Island was reached on February 22,1854, the Mississippi river bridge between Rock Island and Davenport was completed on April 22,1856. In 1857, Abraham Lincoln represented the Rock Island in an important lawsuit regarding bridges over navigable rivers, the suit had been brought by the owner of a steamboat which was destroyed by fire after running into the Mississippi river bridge. Lincoln argued that not only was the steamboat at fault in striking the bridge, the M&M was acquired by the C&RI on July 9,1866, to form the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Company. The railroad expanded through construction and acquisitions in the following decades, the Rock Island stretched across Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Texas. The easternmost reach of the system was Chicago, and the system also reached Memphis, Tennessee, west, it reached Denver, Colorado, and Santa Rosa, New Mexico. Southernmost reaches were to Galveston, Texas, and Eunice, Louisiana while in a direction the Rock Island got as far as Minneapolis. The heaviest traffic was on the Chicago-to-Rock Island and Rock Island-to-Muscatine lines, in common with most American railroad companies, the Rock Island once operated an extensive passenger service. The primary routes served were, Chicago-Los Angeles, Chicago-Denver, Memphis-Tucumcari, the Rock Island ran both Limited and Local service on those routes as well as locals on many other lines on its system. In 1937, the Rock Island introduced Diesel power to its passenger service, in competition with the Santa Fe Chiefs, the Rock Island jointly operated the Golden State Limited with the Southern Pacific Railroad from 1902–1968. On this route, the Rock Islands train was marketed as a low altitude crossing of the Continental Divide, the Rock Island did not concede to the Santa Fes dominance in the Chicago-Los Angeles travel market and re-equipped the train with new streamlined equipment in 1948. At the same time, the Limited was dropped from the trains name, the local run on this line was known as the Imperial. The 1948 modernization of the Golden State occurred with some controversy, in 1947, both the Rock Island and Southern Pacific jointly advertised the coming of a new entry in the Chicago-Los Angeles travel market. The Golden Rocket was scheduled to match the Santa Fes transit time end-to-end and was to have its own dedicated trainsets, one purchased by the Rock Island. As the Rock Islands set of streamlined cars was being finished. The Rock Islands cars were delivered and would find their way into the Golden States fleet soon after delivery, the Golden State was the last first-class train on the Rock Island, retaining its dining cars and sleeping cars until its last run on February 21,1968
35.
Fort Riley
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Fort Riley is a United States Army installation located in North Central Kansas, on the Kansas River, also known as the Kaw, between Junction City and Manhattan. The Fort Riley Military Reservation covers 101,733 acres in Geary, the portion of the fort that contains housing development is part of the Fort Riley census-designated place, with a residential population of 7,761 as of the 2010 census. The fort has a population of nearly 25,000. Fort Riley is named in honor of Major General Bennett C, Riley who led the first military escort along the Santa Fe Trail. The fort was established in 1853 as a military post to protect the movement of people and trade over the Oregon, California, in the years after the Civil War, Fort Riley served as a major United States Cavalry post and school for cavalry tactics and practice. The post was a base for skirmishes with Native Americans after the Civil War ended in 1865, in 1887, Fort Riley became the site of the United States Cavalry School. The famous all-black 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments, the soldiers of which were called Buffalo Soldiers, were stationed at Fort Riley at various times in the 19th, since the end of World War II, various infantry divisions have been assigned there. Most notably, from 1955–1996 the post was home to the famed Big Red One, between 1999–2006, the post was headquarters to the 24th Infantry Division and known as Americas Warfighting Center. In August 2006, the Big Red One relocated its headquarters to Fort Riley from Leighton Barracks, Germany. Camp Whitside is named in honor of Brigadier General Samuel M. Whitside, Army Garrison Partners 10th Air Support Operations Squadron, USAF 407th Army Field Support Brigade 902nd Military Intelligence Group Det. During the 1850s, a number of posts were established at strategic points to provide protection along these arteries of emigration. In the fall of 1852, a party under the command of Captain Robert Chilton, 1st U. S. Dragoons, selected the junction of the Republican. This location, approved by the War Department in January 1853, offered a location from which to organize, train. Surveyors believed the location near the center of the United States and named the site, during the late spring, three companies of the 6th Infantry occupied the camp and began construction of temporary quarters. On June 27,1853, Camp Center became Fort Riley—named in honor of Maj. Gen. Bennett C, Riley who had led the first military escort along the Santa Fe Trail in 1829. The fort took shape around a plain that overlooked the Kansas River valley. The forts design followed the frontier post configuration, buildings were constructed of the most readily available material - in this case. In the spring, troops were dispatched to escort mail trains, at the fort, additional buildings were constructed under the supervision of Capt
36.
Fort Gibson
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Fort Gibson is a historic military site located next to the present day city of Fort Gibson, in Muskogee County Oklahoma. It guarded the American frontier in Indian Territory from 1824 until 1888, the fort succeeded in its peacekeeping mission for more than 50 years, as no massacres or battles occurred there. The fort site is now managed by the Oklahoma Historical Society as the Fort Gibson Historical Site and it is a National Historic Landmark. Colonel Matthew Arbuckle commanded the 7th Infantry Regiment from Fort Smith and he moved some of his troops to establish Cantonment Gibson on 21 April 1824 on the Grand River just above its confluence with the Arkansas River. This was part of a series of forts which the United States established to protect its western border, the US Army named the fort for Colonel George Gibson, Commissary General of Subsistence. The post surgeon began taking meteorological observations in 1824, and the fort provided the earliest known records in Oklahoma. Colonel Arbuckle also established Fort Towson in southern Indian Territory, in the early years, troops constructed a stockade, barracks, other facilities, and roads. They also settled strife between the indigenous Osage Nation, which had been in the area since the century. Congress passed the Indian Removal Act in 1830, which led to a new mission for Cantonment Gibson, the Army designated the cantonment as Fort Gibson in 1832, reflecting its change from a temporary outpost to a semi-permanent garrison. Soldiers at Fort Gibson increasingly dealt with Indians removed from the states to Indian Territory. These newcomers complained about hostility from the Osage Nation and other Plains Indian tribes indigenous to the region, montfort Stokes, former governor of North Carolina, convened a commission at Fort Gibson to address these problems, and troops at the fort supported its work. The American author Washington Irving accompanied troops exploring the southern Plains west of Fort Gibson in 1832 and this excursion and another journey in 1833 both failed to find any significant nomadic Indian tribes, but Washington Irving wrote A Tour of the Prairies in 1835 from his experiences. General Henry Leavenworth in 1834 led First Dragoon Expedition on a mission to the west. The artist George Catlin traveled with the dragoons and made numerous studies, General Leavenworth died during the march, and Colonel Henry Dodge replaced him in command. The expedition finally established contact and negotiated the first treaty with the Indian tribes, debilitating fevers struck and killed many men on this expedition, posing more of a danger than the Native Americans. A West Point officer assigned to the fort said the men felt that expeditions to the Plains in the 1830s were a death sentence. During the Texas Revolution against the weak Mexican government, the Army sent most of the troops stationed at Fort Gibson to the Texas border region and their absence weakened the military power and pacification capacity at Fort Gibson, but the reduced garrison maintained stability in the region. At the height of Indian removal in the 1830s, the garrison at Fort Gibson ranked as the largest in the nation, notable American soldiers stationed at Fort Gibson include Stephen W. Kearny, Robert E. Lee, and Zachary Taylor
37.
Neosho River
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The Neosho River is a tributary of the Arkansas River in eastern Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma in the United States. Its tributaries also drain portions of Missouri and Arkansas, the river is about 463 miles long. Via the Arkansas, it is part of the Mississippi River watershed and its name is an Osage word meaning clear water. The Neoshos headwaters are in Morris County, Kansas, and it flows southeast through Kansas, in Ottawa County, Oklahoma, the river turns south-southwest for the remainder of its course through Oklahoma. It meets the Arkansas River near the city of Muskogee, about a mile downstream of the confluence of the Arkansas River, the area of convergence of the three rivers Arkansas, Verdigris and Neosho is called Three Forks. In Oklahoma the Neosho ends at its confluence with Spring River at Twin Bridges State Park, from that point on it is called the Grand River. The Grand River flows south to the Grand Lake, the Neosho has been dammed at several points along its course, in most cases by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. In Kansas, a dam upstream of Council Grove forms Council Grove Lake, there are also 12 dams in between John Redmond and the Kansas border. In Oklahoma, a dam at Langley forms the Neoshos largest reservoir, a dam near Locust Grove forms Lake Hudson, and a dam upstream of Fort Gibson forms Fort Gibson Lake. In Kansas, the Neosho is joined by the Cottonwood River in Lyon County, in Oklahoma, it is joined by the Spring River in Ottawa County and the Elk River in Delaware County
38.
Fort Riley, Kansas
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Fort Riley is a United States Army installation located in North Central Kansas, on the Kansas River, also known as the Kaw, between Junction City and Manhattan. The Fort Riley Military Reservation covers 101,733 acres in Geary, the portion of the fort that contains housing development is part of the Fort Riley census-designated place, with a residential population of 7,761 as of the 2010 census. The fort has a population of nearly 25,000. Fort Riley is named in honor of Major General Bennett C, Riley who led the first military escort along the Santa Fe Trail. The fort was established in 1853 as a military post to protect the movement of people and trade over the Oregon, California, in the years after the Civil War, Fort Riley served as a major United States Cavalry post and school for cavalry tactics and practice. The post was a base for skirmishes with Native Americans after the Civil War ended in 1865, in 1887, Fort Riley became the site of the United States Cavalry School. The famous all-black 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments, the soldiers of which were called Buffalo Soldiers, were stationed at Fort Riley at various times in the 19th, since the end of World War II, various infantry divisions have been assigned there. Most notably, from 1955–1996 the post was home to the famed Big Red One, between 1999–2006, the post was headquarters to the 24th Infantry Division and known as Americas Warfighting Center. In August 2006, the Big Red One relocated its headquarters to Fort Riley from Leighton Barracks, Germany. Camp Whitside is named in honor of Brigadier General Samuel M. Whitside, Army Garrison Partners 10th Air Support Operations Squadron, USAF 407th Army Field Support Brigade 902nd Military Intelligence Group Det. During the 1850s, a number of posts were established at strategic points to provide protection along these arteries of emigration. In the fall of 1852, a party under the command of Captain Robert Chilton, 1st U. S. Dragoons, selected the junction of the Republican. This location, approved by the War Department in January 1853, offered a location from which to organize, train. Surveyors believed the location near the center of the United States and named the site, during the late spring, three companies of the 6th Infantry occupied the camp and began construction of temporary quarters. On June 27,1853, Camp Center became Fort Riley—named in honor of Maj. Gen. Bennett C, Riley who had led the first military escort along the Santa Fe Trail in 1829. The fort took shape around a plain that overlooked the Kansas River valley. The forts design followed the frontier post configuration, buildings were constructed of the most readily available material - in this case. In the spring, troops were dispatched to escort mail trains, at the fort, additional buildings were constructed under the supervision of Capt
39.
Indian Territory
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In general, the tribes ceded land they occupied in exchange for land grants in an area purchased by the United States federal government from Napoleonic France, the Louisiana Purchase. The concept of an Indian Territory was an outcome of the 18th-, after the Civil War, the policy of the government was one of assimilation. The term Indian Reserve describes lands the British government set aside for indigenous tribes between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River in the time before the Revolutionary War. The borders of Indian Territory were reduced in size as various Organic Acts were passed by Congress to create incorporated territories of the United States. The 1907 Oklahoma Enabling Act created the state of Oklahoma by combining Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory. Indian Territory, also known as the Indian Territories and the Indian Country, was land within the United States of America reserved for the forced re-settlement of Native Americans, the general borders were set by the Indian Intercourse Act of 1834. The territory was located in the Midwest, while Congress passed several Organic Acts that provided a path for statehood for much of the original Indian Country, Congress never passed an Organic Act for the Indian Territory. Indian Territory was never an organized incorporated territory of the United States, in general, tribes could not sell land to non-Indians. The region never had a government until after the American Civil War. Therefore, the location commonly called Indian Territory was not a traditional territory. These re-written treaties included provisions for a legislature with proportional representation from various tribes. In time, the Indian Territory was reduced to what is now Oklahoma, the Organic Act of 1890 reduced Indian Territory to the lands occupied by the Five Civilized Tribes and the Tribes of the Quapaw Indian Agency. The remaining western portion of the former Indian Territory became the Oklahoma Territory, the Oklahoma organic act applied the laws of Nebraska to the incorporated territory of Oklahoma Territory, and the laws of Arkansas to the still unincorporated Indian Territory. The proclamation limited the settlement of Europeans to Crown-claimed lands east of the Appalachian Mountains, the territory remained active until the Treaty of Paris that ended the American Revolutionary War, and land was ceded to the United States. After the defeat of the British, the Americans twice invaded the Ohio Country and were twice defeated, the period after the American Revolutionary War was one of rapid western expansion. The areas occupied by Native Americans in the United States were called Indian country, in 1803 the United States of America agreed to purchase Frances claim to French Louisiana for a total of $15 million. President Thomas Jefferson doubted the legality of the purchase, however, the chief negotiator, Robert R. Livingston believed that the 3rd article of the treaty providing for the Louisiana Purchase would be acceptable to congress. Indian removal became the policy of the United States government with the passage of the 1830 Indian Removal Act
40.
Gulf of Mexico
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The Gulf of Mexico is an ocean basin largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States, on the southwest and south by Mexico, and on the southeast by Cuba. The U. S. states of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas border the Gulf on the north, Atlantic and Pacific coasts, or sometimes the south coast, in juxtaposition to the Great Lakes region being the north coast. One of the seven main areas is the Gulf of Mexico basin. The Gulf of Mexico formed approximately 300 million years ago as a result of plate tectonics, the Gulfs basin is roughly oval and is approximately 810 nautical miles wide and floored by sedimentary rocks and recent sediments. It is connected to part of the Atlantic Ocean through the Florida Straits between the U. S. and Cuba, and with the Caribbean Sea via the Yucatan Channel between Mexico and Cuba, with the narrow connection to the Atlantic, the Gulf experiences very small tidal ranges. The size of the Gulf basin is approximately 1.6 million km2, almost half of the basin is shallow continental shelf waters. The basin contains a volume of roughly 2,500 quadrillion liters, the consensus among geologists who have studied the geology of the Gulf of Mexico, is that prior to the Late Triassic, the Gulf of Mexico did not exist. It was created by the collision of plates that formed Pangea. As interpreted by Roy Van Arsdale and Randel T. Cox, geologists and other Earth scientists agree in general that the present Gulf of Mexico basin originated in Late Triassic time as the result of rifting within Pangea. The rifting was associated with zones of weakness within Pangea, including sutures where the Laurentia, South American, first, there was a Late Triassic-Early Jurassic phase of rifting during which rift valleys formed and filled with continental red beds. Second, as rifting progressed through Early and Middle Jurassic time and it was at this time that tectonics first created a connection to the Pacific Ocean across central Mexico and later eastward to the Atlantic Ocean. This flooded the basin created by rifting and crustal thinning to create the Gulf of Mexico. While the Gulf of Mexico was a basin, the subsiding transitional crust was blanketed by the widespread deposition of Louann Salt. Initially, during the Late Jurassic, continued rifting widened the Gulf of Mexico and progressed to the point that sea-floor spreading, at this point, sufficient circulation with the Atlantic Ocean was established that the deposition of Louann Salt ceased. During the Late Jurassic through Early Cretaceous, the occupied by the Gulf of Mexico experienced a period of cooling. The subsidence was the result of a combination of stretching, cooling. Initially, the combination of stretching and cooling caused about 5–7 km of tectonic subsidence of the central thin transitional
41.
William Crush
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Crush, Texas, was a temporary city established as a one-day publicity stunt in 1896. William George Crush, general agent of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad. No admission was charged, and train fares to the site were at the reduced rate of US$2 from any location in Texas. As a result, about 40,000 people showed up on September 15,1896, making the new town of Crush, Texas, unexpectedly, the impact caused both engine boilers to explode, resulting in several fatalities and numerous injuries among the spectators. Two wells were drilled at the site 3 miles south of the town of West in McLennan County, circus tents from Ringling Brothers were erected as well as a grandstand. The train engines were painted green and bright red, both 4-4-0 American locomotives. A special track was built alongside the Katy track so there was no chance a runaway train could get onto the main line. Crush, Texas was named after Mr. Crush who worked for the railroad, the trains toured the state for months in advance, advertising the event. The event had to be delayed for an hour because the crowd resisted being pressed back by the police to what was supposedly a safe distance. About 5,00 pm the two trains, pulling cars loaded with ties, were rolled to the opposite ends of a 4-mile track. The engineers and crew opened the steam to a setting, rode for exactly 4 turns of the drive wheels. Each train reached a speed of about 45 miles per hour by the time they met near the anticipated spot, when the trains collided, there was a large explosion. Debris—some pieces as large as half a drive-wheel—was blown hundreds of feet into the air, some of the debris came down among the spectators, killing two or three and injuring many more. Event photographer Jarvis Joe Deane lost one eye to a flying bolt, a contemporary newspaper speculated that the explosion occurred shortly after the initial impact. Crush was immediately fired from the Katy railroad, in light of a lack of negative publicity, however, he was rehired the next day. The wreck was featured in an episode of the History Channel series Wild West Tech and it was copyrighted on October 15,1896, a short month after the event. The piece was notable because it included instructions in the score for how to replicate the sounds of the collision through playing techniques, specific notes. The Crash at Crush by Clay Swartz, pp 114–118, Cowboys & Indians magazine, five-page article with four large photographs
42.
Crush, Texas
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Crush, Texas, was a temporary city established as a one-day publicity stunt in 1896. William George Crush, general agent of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad. No admission was charged, and train fares to the site were at the reduced rate of US$2 from any location in Texas. As a result, about 40,000 people showed up on September 15,1896, making the new town of Crush, Texas, unexpectedly, the impact caused both engine boilers to explode, resulting in several fatalities and numerous injuries among the spectators. Two wells were drilled at the site 3 miles south of the town of West in McLennan County, circus tents from Ringling Brothers were erected as well as a grandstand. The train engines were painted green and bright red, both 4-4-0 American locomotives. A special track was built alongside the Katy track so there was no chance a runaway train could get onto the main line. Crush, Texas was named after Mr. Crush who worked for the railroad, the trains toured the state for months in advance, advertising the event. The event had to be delayed for an hour because the crowd resisted being pressed back by the police to what was supposedly a safe distance. About 5,00 pm the two trains, pulling cars loaded with ties, were rolled to the opposite ends of a 4-mile track. The engineers and crew opened the steam to a setting, rode for exactly 4 turns of the drive wheels. Each train reached a speed of about 45 miles per hour by the time they met near the anticipated spot, when the trains collided, there was a large explosion. Debris—some pieces as large as half a drive-wheel—was blown hundreds of feet into the air, some of the debris came down among the spectators, killing two or three and injuring many more. Event photographer Jarvis Joe Deane lost one eye to a flying bolt, a contemporary newspaper speculated that the explosion occurred shortly after the initial impact. Crush was immediately fired from the Katy railroad, in light of a lack of negative publicity, however, he was rehired the next day. The wreck was featured in an episode of the History Channel series Wild West Tech and it was copyrighted on October 15,1896, a short month after the event. The piece was notable because it included instructions in the score for how to replicate the sounds of the collision through playing techniques, specific notes. The Crash at Crush by Clay Swartz, pp 114–118, Cowboys & Indians magazine, five-page article with four large photographs
43.
Ragtime
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Ragtime – also spelled rag-time or rag time – is a musical genre that enjoyed its peak popularity between 1895 and 1918. Its cardinal trait is its syncopated, or ragged, rhythm, the genre has its origins in African-American communities like St. Louis years before being published as popular sheet music for piano. Ernest Hogan was a pioneer of music and was the first to compose ragtime into sheet music. The composition was called LA Pas Ma LA and it was released in 1895, Hogan has also been credited for coining the term ragtime. The term is derived from his hometown Shake Rag in Bowling Green. Ben Harney, who is also a Kentucky native has often credited for introducing the music to the mainstream public. His first ragtime composition Youve been an old wagon but you done broke helped popularize the musical genre. The composition was published in 1895 but released in 1896, Ragtime was also a modification of the march made popular by John Philip Sousa, with additional polyrhythms coming from African music. For at least 12 years after its publication, Maple Leaf Rag heavily influenced subsequent ragtime composers with its melody lines, Ragtime fell out of favor as jazz claimed the publics imagination after 1917, but there have been numerous revivals since the music has been re-discovered. First in the early 1940s, many bands began to include ragtime in their repertoire. A more significant revival occurred in the 1950s as a variety of ragtime styles of the past were made available on records, and new rags were composed, published. In 1971 Joshua Rifkin brought out a compilation of Joplins work which was nominated for a Grammy Award, in 1973 The New England Ragtime Ensemble recorded The Red Back Book, a compilation of some of Joplins rags in period orchestrations edited by conservatory president Gunther Schuller. This also won a Grammy for Best Chamber Music Performance of the year and was named Billboards Top Classical Album of 1974, subsequently, the motion picture The Sting brought ragtime to a wide audience with its soundtrack of Joplin tunes. The films rendering of The Entertainer, adapted and orchestrated by Marvin Hamlisch, was a Top 5 hit in 1974. Ragtime – with Joplins work at the forefront – has been cited as an American equivalent of the minuets of Mozart, Ragtime also influenced classical composers including Erik Satie, Claude Debussy and Igor Stravinsky. Ragtime originated in African American music in the late 19th century and descended from the jigs and march music played by African American bands, referred to as jig piano or piano thumping. By the start of the 20th century, it widely popular throughout North America and was listened and danced to, performed. A distinctly American musical style, ragtime may be considered a synthesis of African syncopation and European classical music, some early piano rags are entitled marches, and jig and rag were used interchangeably in the mid-1890s
44.
Scott Joplin
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Scott Joplin was an African American composer and pianist. Joplin achieved fame for his compositions and was dubbed the King of Ragtime Writers. During his brief career, he wrote 44 original ragtime pieces, one ragtime ballet, One of his first, and most popular pieces, the Maple Leaf Rag, became ragtimes first and most influential hit, and has been recognized as the archetypal rag. Joplin was born into a family of railway laborers in Northeast Texas. Joplin grew up in Texarkana, where he formed a vocal quartet, during the late 1880s he left his job as a laborer with the railroad, and travelled around the American South as an itinerant musician. He went to Chicago for the Worlds Fair of 1893, which played a part in making ragtime a national craze by 1897. Joplin moved to Sedalia, Missouri, in 1894 and earned a living as a teacher, there he taught future ragtime composers Arthur Marshall, Scott Hayden. Joplin began publishing music in 1895, and publication of his Maple Leaf Rag in 1899 brought him fame and this piece had a profound influence on subsequent writers of ragtime. It also brought the composer a steady income for life, though Joplin did not reach this level of success again, in 1901 Joplin moved to St. Louis, where he continued to compose and publish music, and regularly performed in the St. Louis community. The score to his first opera A Guest of Honor was confiscated in 1903 with his belongings because of a non-payment of bills and he continued to compose and publish music, and in 1907 moved to New York City to find a producer for a new opera. He attempted to go beyond the limitations of the form that made him famous. His second opera, Treemonisha, was not received well at its partially staged performance in 1915, in 1916 Joplin descended into dementia as a result of syphilis. He was admitted to an institution in January 1917. His music was rediscovered and returned to popularity in the early 1970s with the release of an album recorded by Joshua Rifkin. This was followed by the Academy Award–winning 1973 movie The Sting that featured several of his compositions including The Entertainer, the opera Treemonisha was finally produced in full to wide acclaim in 1972. In 1976, Joplin was posthumously awarded a Pulitzer Prize, according to author Edward A. Berlin, One tenacious myth tells us that Joplin was born in Texarkana, Texas, on November 24,1868. The location is easily dispensed with, Texarkana was not established until 1873, consequently, it appears possible that Joplin, born 12 years later, could have been born in Texarkana. Despite evidence to such a conclusion, some insist that Joplin was born in Linden, Texas
45.
Joseph A. Kemp
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Joseph Alexander Kemp, sometimes known as Jodie Kemp, was an entrepreneur and investor who along with his brother-in-law Frank Kell is considered one of the modern founders of Wichita Falls, Texas. Kemp was born in Clifton in Bosque County in Central Texas and he was the second of eight children of William T. Kemp, originally from Tennessee, and the former Emma Frances Stinnett, a native of Missouri. William Kemp arrived in Clifton in 1856, where he became a prosperous merchant, the third Kemp child, William Clinton Kemp, died in early childhood. In 1878, Joseph Kemp graduated from Clifton High School and took over operation of his fathers general store, within two years, Kemp sold his interest in the store at a profit to a partner. While Kemp moved to Wichita Falls in 1883, Frank Kell and his wife Lula, Kemps sister and he sold that business in 1887. In 1890, Kemp launched the J. A. Kemp Wholesale Grocery Company and he established branch stores throughout West Texas. This enterprise helped to make Wichita Falls into an important regional trade center, in 1903, Kemp sold controlling interest in the grocery company but maintained the title of company vice president. From 1891 to 1914, Kemp was president of the former City National Bank, Frank Kell played a similar role with the American National Bank and Trust Company, which maintains a downtown branch at 719 Scott Avenue. In 1894, Kemp chartered and assumed the presidency of the Wichita Falls Railway, Missouri-Kansas-Texas officials then built in Wichita Falls a station, offices, a roundhouse, and three switching tracks. Kemp organized the Wichita Falls and Southern Railroad, which connected Wichita Falls with the fields around Newcastle near Graham in Young County. He also established the Wichita Falls and Wellington, which linked Wichita Falls and Wellington in Collingsworth County, Kemp served as president of each of these rail companies. In 1911, the Missouri-Kansas-Texas purchased Kemps remaining lines, including the eighteen miles of the Wichita Falls Railway, Kemp hence helped to make Wichita Falls the hub city of northern and western Texas railroads. In 1918, Kemp and two established the K-M-A Oil Company. He subsequently became a shareholder and vice president of the Texhoma Oil and Refining Company. In 1910, Kemps Wichita Falls Traction Company established a rail line. He also founded and served as president of both the Wichita Falls Glass and the Wichita Bottle Manufacturing companies and he established the Wichita Motor Truck Company, which manufactured and sold the durable Wichita trucks throughout the United States and Canada from 1911 until the company closed in 1931. The plant was located on Arthur Street and is now inhabited by the Wichita Energy Company and these Kemp endeavors as a whole worked to establish Wichita Falls as a manufacturing center. In 1915, Kemp constructed a dairy barn and introduced Guernsey cattle into the North Texas area
46.
Wichita Falls, Texas
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Wichita Falls is a city in and the county seat of Wichita County, Texas, United States. Wichita Falls is the city of the Wichita Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Archer, Clay. According to the 2010 census, the city had a population of 104,553, of interest is the Newby-McMahon Building, constructed downtown in 1919 and featured in Robert Ripleys Ripleys Believe It or Not. The Choctaw Native Americans settled the area in the early 19th century from their native Mississippi area once Americans negotiated to relocate them after the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, American settlers arrived in the 1860s to form cattle ranches. The city was officially titled Wichita Falls on September 27,1872, on that day, a sale of town lots was held at what is now the corner of Seventh and Ohio Streets – the birthplace of the city. The Fort Worth & Denver City Railway arrived in September 1882, the city grew westwards from the original FW&DC train depot which was located at the northwest corner of Seventh Street and the FW&DC. This area is now referred to as the Depot Square Historic District, the early history of Wichita Falls well into the 20th century also rests on the work of two entrepreneurs, Joseph A. Kemp and his brother-in-law, Frank Kell. Kemp and Kell were pioneers in food processing and retailing, flour milling, railroads, cattle, banking, a flood in 1886 destroyed the original falls on the Wichita River for which the city was named. After nearly 100 years of wanting to visit the nonexistent falls. The recreated falls are 54 ft high and recirculate at 3,500 gallons per minute and they are visible to south-bound traffic on Interstate 44. The city is seeking funding to rebuild and restore the downtown area. Both firms continued to use a portion of their former refineries as gasoline/oil terminal facilities for many years, a devastating tornado hit the north and northwest portions of Wichita Falls along with Sheppard Air Force Base during the afternoon of April 3,1964. As the first violent tornado on record to hit the Wichita Falls area, it left seven dead, additionally, the tornado caused roughly $15 million in property damage with about 225 homes destroyed and another 250 damaged. It was rated as an F5, the highest rating on the Fujita scale, an F4 tornado struck the heavily populated southern sections of Wichita Falls in the late afternoon on Tuesday, April 10,1979. It was part of an outbreak that produced 30 tornadoes around the region and it left 20,000 people homeless and caused $400 million in damage, a U. S. record not topped by an individual tornado until the F5 Moore-Oklahoma City tornado of May 3,1999. Wichita Falls is about 15 miles south of the border with Oklahoma,115 mi northwest of Fort Worth, and 140 mi southwest of Oklahoma City. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 70.71 square miles. Wichita Falls experiences a subtropical climate, with some of the highest summer daily maximum temperatures in the entire U. S. outside of the Desert Southwest
47.
Henrietta, Texas
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Henrietta is a city in and the county seat of Clay County, Texas, United States. It is part of the Wichita Falls, Texas Metropolitan Statistical Area, the population was 3,141 at the 2010 census, a decline of 123 from the 2000 tabulation of 3,264. Henrietta is one of the oldest settled towns in north central Texas and it sits at the crossroads of U. S. Highway 287, U. S. Highway 82, State Highway 148, and Farm to Market Road 1197 in north central Clay County. Clay and Montague counties were separated in 1857 from Cooke County to the east, the naming of the town remains a mystery, though several explanations have been offered. Regardless of the origin of its name, Henrietta became the center of gravity for the fledgling county, in 1860, as the only town in the county, it had 109 residents,10 houses, and a general store. It sat at the far edge of Anglo expansion in north-central Texas. In 1862, Henrietta opened its post office, in the early 1860s, there were continuous attacks from local tribes. By late 1862, Henrietta was abandoned, and white settlers returned east to Cooke, anglos continued to attempt resettlement, and in 1865 after the Civil War, a group attempting resettlement was massacred. A number of Quakers attempted to reoccupy the former townsite, in 1870, fifty soldiers and Kiowa Indians fought a battle in the ruins of Henrietta. After the battle, white settlers returned to Henrietta, this time permanently, in 1874, the post office reopened, and Henrietta quickly became the economic hub of north-central Texas. In 1882, the Fort Worth and Denver Railway reached Henrietta on its side, and in 1887, Henrietta became the westernmost terminus for the Gainesville, Henrietta. This particular track was abandoned in 1970, mK&T then built in Wichita Falls a station, offices, a roundhouse, and three switching tracks. After heavy lobbying by businessmen, Henrietta became a supply point for various operations in north-central Texas, including mining in Foard. The Southwestern Railway Company in 1910 completed a rail linking Henrietta with Archer City, though it had been settled earlier, Henrietta did not incorporate until 1881. The Clay County courthouse was built in 1884 and is still in use, by 1890, the population had reached 2,100, and the town boasted a 400-seat opera house, five churches, a new jailhouse, and a school. From 1893 to 1895, it had a college - Henrietta Normal College - for the training of teachers and it remained the economic hub of the county at the turn of the 20th century. When the top floors of the burned, the facility closed. A portion of the lower floor now houses an antiques store, the growth of Henrietta waned in the 20th century as Wichita Falls grew rapidly into the most prosperous economic center in the area
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