at one time the railroad magnets (Harrimans & Rockafelers) owned every thing one mile each side of the railroad tracks and every thing in, under, over, or on it, today it is the tracks and 120 feet either side of center. In the 1800s steel and Iron were not easy to access in the frontier, the closest and easiest source was the railroad tracks, the railroads were not the favorite enterprise of the day, (for good reasion) so ranchers and local black smiths and some enterprising brokers found railroads a great and relitively easy sorce for steel and Iron. probably half the horses in the west were wearing shoes made of railroad spikes. (just an interesting factoid) another is that at one point Rockafeller owned 50% of all the wealth in America, today it is impossable to tell as the Rockafeller wealth is hidden in thousands of trusts arround the world.
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