340 Chapter 12 The Sections Go Their Own Ways
efficiency helps explain why wheat output rose by
nearly 75 percent in the 1850s.
The railroad had an equally powerful impact on
American cities. The eastern seaports benefited, and so
did countless intermediate centers, such as Buffalo and
Cincinnati. But no city was affected more profoundly
by railroads than Chicago. In 1850 not a single line
had reached there; five years later it was terminal for
2,200 miles of track and controlled the commerce of an
imperial domain. By extending half a dozen lines west
to the Mississippi, it drained off nearly all the river traf-
fic north of St. Louis. The Illinois Central sucked the
expanding output of the prairies into Chicago as well.
Most of this freight went eastward over the new rail-
roads or on the Great Lakes and the Erie Canal. Nearly
350,000 tons of shipping plied the lakes by 1855.Tobacco
Corn
Wheat
Cotton
Rice
Union States
Confederate StatesTEXASCANADALOUISIANAARKANSASMISSOURIIOWAWISCONSINMINNESOTAMICHIGANINDIANAOHIO(West Virginia,
ILLINOIS State 1863)MISSISSIPPI ALABAMAFLORIDAUNORGANIZED
TERRITORYNEBRASKA
TERRITORYNEBRASKA
TERRITORYKANSAS
TERRITORYKANSAS
TERRITORYUNORGANIZED
TERRITORYGEORGIASOUTH
CAROLINANORTH
CAROLINAVIRGINIA
KENTUCKYTENNESSEENEW YORKPENNSYLVANIA N.J.CONN.MASS.VERMONTN.H.MAINER.I.MARYLANDDELAWAREGulf of
MexicoATLANTIC
OCEANAgriculture, 1860Cotton was central to the southern economy, while tobacco was the primary crop in Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky.
Wheat was the key crop in the upper Midwest, and corn was grown nearly everywhere.