transcontinental railroad travel cost time American West

The transcontinental railroad made cross-country travel cheaper and faster

1/10 the cost

The railroad cut a cross-country trip from months to days, at one-tenth the cost of travel by wagon or stagecoach. Lower shipping costs linked distant cities into national markets where prices varied less, and made farming, ranching, and mining profitable in places that had been hard to reach.

Gravity wins at large scales even though electricity is much stronger

Electric forces between charged particles are far stronger than gravity. But large objects such as planets usually contain nearly equal amounts of positive and negative charge, so most of their electric effects cancel out. Gravity does not cancel this way, so it dominates across large distances.

An epidemic killed most Native Americans in Massachusetts Bay

About 90%

Between 1617 and 1619, an epidemic killed about 90% of Native Americans in the Massachusetts Bay region. The disease was most likely smallpox, amid outbreaks brought by European colonists.

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transcontinental railroad travel cost time American West

The transcontinental railroad made cross-country travel cheaper and faster

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