648. Nothing Like it in the World by Ambrose- summary

648.  Nothing Like it in the World by Ambrose. Ambrose is a professional historian who writes in a simple style yet covers complex and intricate material.  His main contention is that the Transcontinental railroad would not have happened without government granting the land to the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific AND a capitalistic system which used competition to achieve success.   He also suggests that the rail line would never have happened without the Civil War.  The idea of the transcontinental railroad was urged and promoted for years before construction began.  Yet, the southern states wanted a southern route with the implication of the extension of slavery;  the North wanted a northern route without the possibility of the extension of slavery.  With the coming of war, Lincoln who had been interested in the idea for years, signed the bill into law in 1862.  Ambrose points outs the corruption, mistakes and inefficiency of construction. (However, the rail line was built faster and more efficiently than any other railroad every built anywhere by any country.)  Yet, he seems to admire and cause the reader to admire how the government incentives promoted competition and confusion at the same time AND to admire how people with diverse reasons for building the railroad provided a service to our/their country to this very day.  It is interesting too the number of key people, who built the railroads which met in Utah, realized that the railroad was essential for economic power, national security and our place as a world power.