The race underground : Boston, New York, and the incredible rivalry that built America's first subway / Doug Most.
Most, Doug.
2014
HE4491.B782 M67 2014 (Mapit)
Available at General Collection

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Title The race underground : Boston, New York, and the incredible rivalry that built America's first subway / Doug Most.
Author Most, Doug.
Edition First edition.
ISBN 9780312591328 hardcover alkaline paper
0312591322 hardcover alkaline paper
Published New York : St. Martin's Press, 2014.
Language English
Description viii, 404 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm
Call Number HE4491.B782 M67 2014
Dewey Decimal Classification 388.4/20974446109034
Summary "In the late nineteenth century, as cities like Boston and New York grew larger, the streets became increasingly clogged with horse-drawn carts. When the great blizzard of 1888 brought New York City to a halt, a solution had to be found. Two brothers--Henry Melville Whitney of Boston and William Collins Whitney of New York City--pursued the dream of his city being the first American metropolis to have a subway and the great race was on. The competition between Boston and New York was played out in an era not unlike our own, one of economic upheaval, job losses, bitter political tensions, and the question of America's place in the world. The Race Underground is peopled with the famous, like Boss Tweed, and Thomas Edison, and the not-so-famous, like the countless "sandhogs" who dug and blasted into the earth's crust, sometimes losing their lives in the process of building the subway's tunnels. Doug Most chronicles the science of the subway, looks at fears people had about travelling underground and tells a story as exciting as any ever ripped from the pages of U.S. history. The Race Underground is a great American saga of two rival American cities, the powerful interests within, and an invention that changed the lives of millions"-- Provided by publisher.
Bibliography, etc. Note Includes bibliographical references and index.
Record Appears in On-Campus Resources > Books
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Introduction: Two Cities, One Crisis
PART I. THE VISIONARIES
A Secret Subway
Where Spirits, the Devil and the Dead Live
A Family for the Ages
History Made in Richmond
PART II. THE BLIZZARD AND THE BILLIONAIRES
The Blizzard That Changed Everything
New York City's Moses
William Whitney's Missed Opportunity
The Engineer and the Piano Maker
The Rise and Fall of Henry Whitney
PART III. TRAGEDIES, TRIUMPHS
Bidding to Build History
"Meehanville"
Boom!
"First Car off the Earth!"
The Brains, the Builder and the Banker
Playing with Dynamite
October 27, 1904
Epilogue
Author's Note.

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