REGION OF DISCONTENT 



lington and Missouri River, the Hannibal and St. Joseph, and a host of 

 minor lines began to penetrate where water routes were too far distant for 

 easy use. These and other railroads, helped along in most instances by 

 federal grants of public land turned over to the states for the purpose, built 

 even more feverishly after the Civil War, while great transcontinentals, 



WC5TERM 



MiDDII WEST 







The Center of Agricultural Discontent 



aided by land subsidies direct from the United States government, pushed 

 their railheads ever farther and farther west. The western Middle West 

 was thus from its infancy conditioned to railroads. Without them and 

 the markets they opened up, its settlement would have been long delayed 

 and in some portions could hardly have occurred at all. 



Another factor tending to emphasize the difference between the eastern 

 and the western Middle West was, and to some extent still is, the degree 

 of industrialization to which each has attained. West of Chicago one finds 



