It's hard to believe that California and Oregon became states 20 and 10 years, respectively, before railroads tied the country together.
The driving of the Golden Spike in 1869 was a beginning, not an end. Railroads only continued to grow in importance, and power, and ruthlessness.
Michael Hiltzik, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist at the Los Angeles Times, takes up the story of railroads in the four decades after the Golden Spike, in Iron Empires: Robber Barons, Railroads, and the Making of Modern America.
People and goods got moved, and the people in charge got rich. But a lot of abuses took place as well. We visit with the author.