To celebrate the completion of the first railroad to reach the Mississippi River, the owners of the Chicago & Roch Island invited a distinguished group of Eastern notables and investors to travel by rail to Rock Island, Illinois, and from there by steamboat to St. Anthony Falls in fledgling Minnesota Territory, all at the railroad's expense. This "Grand Excursion" occurred a week after President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act revoking the Missouri Compromise (1820), which had prohibited slavery in Kansas and ...
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To celebrate the completion of the first railroad to reach the Mississippi River, the owners of the Chicago & Roch Island invited a distinguished group of Eastern notables and investors to travel by rail to Rock Island, Illinois, and from there by steamboat to St. Anthony Falls in fledgling Minnesota Territory, all at the railroad's expense. This "Grand Excursion" occurred a week after President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act revoking the Missouri Compromise (1820), which had prohibited slavery in Kansas and Nebraska. Historians agree that this act was the decisive event setting the nation on a collision course to the Civil War. A microcosm of antebellum society, the excusionists debated national policy and happily viewed the spectacular Upper Mississippi scenery, while their nation was careening headlong into disaster.
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Seller's Description:
Good. Good condition. Good dust jacket. A copy that has been read but remains intact. May contain markings such as bookplates, stamps, limited notes and highlighting, or a few light stains.
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Seller's Description:
Very good. Connecting readers with great books since 1972! Used books may not include companion materials, and may have some shelf wear or limited writing. We ship orders daily and Customer Service is our top priority!
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Seller's Description:
Small 4to. Tan cloth with gilt spine lettering, pictorial dust jacket. 288pp. Frontispiece, illustrations. Fine/near fine. Handsome first edition of this chronicle of the famed 1854 Mississippi steamboat expedition from Rock Island, Illinois, to St. Anthony Falls in the Minnesota Territory, a celebration of the first railroad line that reached Ol' Man River. Tipped to front flyleaf is a fine decorative-edged bookplate signed boldly in full by Keillor in black ballpoint.
Edition:
First Edition [stated], presumed first printing
Publisher:
Afton Historical Society Press
Published:
2004
Language:
English
Alibris ID:
16793473618
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Seller's Description:
Very good in Very good jacket. Format is approximately 8 inches by 10 inches. 288 pages. illustrations. DJ has slight wear and soiling. Foreword by Paul A. Verret, Preface, Epilogue, Endnotes, and Index. Chapters are: Railroad Men from Near and Far, New England Find Her Onward Movement as a Stand, All Under a Full Head of Steam, Off She Goes! , Rain and Speaking, Words and Water, Bluffs like Gigantic Sentinels, The Greatest Epoch that has Ever Dawned, Going Down this Noblest of all Rivers, We Are on the Way to the Pacific, and An Angry, Turbid, Almost Frightful Looking Stream. Steven James Keillor (born April 25, 1948) is a Minnesota historian and author. He received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. in American History from the University of Minnesota. He has been an adjunct professor at Bethel University and was previously an assistant professor at Iowa State University. He has published several scholarly books in American history and political biography including Grand Excursion: Antebellum America Discovers the Upper Mississippi, Erik Ramstad and the Empire Builder, and This Rebellious House: American History & the Truth of Christianity. He has edited a Civil War memoir No More Gallant a Deed and written a book of essays and poems, Prisoners of Hope: Sundry Sunday Essays. Paul A. Verret was an advisor to the Katherine B. Andersen Fund of the Saint Paul Foundation and served on the Board of Directors of the Minnesota Historical Society and the Ramsey County Historical Society. The Katherine B. Anderson Fund of the Saint Paul Foundation supported this publication. To celebrate the completion of the first railroad to reach the Mississippi River, the owners of the Chicago & Rock Island invited a distinguished group of Eastern notables and investors to travel by rail to Rock Island, Illinois, and from there by steamboat to St. Anthony Falls in fledgling Minnesota Territory, all at the railroad's expense. Nearly a thousand invited guests gathered in Chicago on the morning of June 5, 1854, to board two long trains that pulled out of the La Salle Street Station, bound for Rock Island on newly completed track. Arriving in Rock Island that same evening, the trains were greeted by spectacular fireworks, which saw the steamboats and their passengers off on their seven-day trip upriver. This "Grand Excursion" occurred a week after President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act revoking the Missouri Compromise (1820), which had prohibited slavery in Kansas and Nebraska. Historians agree that this act was the decisive event setting the nation on a collision course to civil war. A microcosm of antebellum society, the excursionists debated national policy and happily viewed the spectacular Upper Mississippi scenery, while their country was careening headlong into disaster. To narrate the story of the seven-day Grand Excursion of 1854, author Steven Keillor makes excellent use of editors' accounts, journals, and letters.