George Francis Train, Speculation, and the Territorial Development of the Great Plains

A Madman and a Visionary: George Francis Train, Speculation, and the Territorial Development of the Great Plains Rebekah Crowe Great Plains Quarterly, Volume 34, Number 1, Winter 2014, pp. 35-61 (Article) Published by University of Nebraska Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/gpq.2014.0003 For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/536887 [ This content has been declared free to read by the pubisher during the COVID-19 pandemic. ] A Madman and a Visionary George Francis Train, Speculation, and the Territorial Development of the Great Plains Rebekah Crowe t three o’clock on a December aft ernoon destiny, in “a most eloquent and enthusiastic Ain 1863, about one thousand inhabitants character.”2 During the speech, Train insisted of Omaha, Nebraska Territory, gathered two that millions of immigrants would fl ood into miles north of the ferry landing to watch the Nebraska, eager to take their part in this most groundbreaking ceremony for the Union Pa- American of adventures. In his last autobiog- cifi c Railroad. Th e usual dignitaries, includ- raphy, Train excerpted the most famous por- ing the governor and mayor, gave run- of- the- tion of his speech: “Th e great Pacifi c Railway mill speeches about progress and the settling is commenced, and if you knew the man who of the West. Th en, aft er some coaxing from has hold of the aff air as well as I do, no doubt the crowd, a handsome man in his thirties would ever arise as to its speedy completion. climbed into a buggy and began to speak to his Th e President shows his good judgment in spellbound audience.1 George Francis Train locating the road where the Almighty placed (Fig. 1), already well known across the coun- the signal station, at the entrance to a garden try and around the world for both his business seven hundred miles in length and twenty genius and extremely energetic oratory, used broad.”3 the rhetoric common to such events, celebrat- Far from the death and destruction of the ing the combination of progress and manifest Civil War and the eastern centers of predatory business, “those assembled felt that they bore Key Words: George Pickering Bemis, Credit Mobilier of Amer- witness to the start of a great enterprise and a ica, Cyrus Hall McCormick, Nebraska, Omaha, Union Pacifi c Railroad watershed that ushered in a new industrial era in America,” exactly the feeling George Fran- Rebekah Crowe is Assistant Professor of History at Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, Texas. She received her bach- cis Train intended to bestow on the crowd elor’s degree from Wayland, a master’s degree from Baylor during his speech.4 His enthusiastic prediction University, and is a doctoral candidate in the Department of History and Geography at Texas Christian University in Fort about the hordes of immigrants impatient to Worth, Texas. claim their little portion of territory opened [GPQ 34 (Winter 2014):35–61] 35 36 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 including Train’s aforementioned oration.7 Immediately aft er the ceremony, Train sent Union Pacifi c vice president Th omas C. Du- rant, manning the company’s headquarters in New York City, a fl urry of telegrams describ- ing the event and subsequent celebrations.8 Th e next day, the telegraphic barrage contin- ued, and Train urged Durant to check national newspapers for reports.9 As a national celebrity, Train provided star power to the event, drawing a larger crowd and garnering much more attention from the national press than Durant or most other Union Pacifi c managers could have done. Following the December 2, 1863, groundbreaking, Train spent several years enthusi- astically promoting the Union Pacifi c Rail- road and Nebraska, but by the completion of the transcontinental railway in 1869, George Fig. 1. George Francis Train, ca. 1868. Courtesy of Francis Train had moved on to other endeav- the Douglas County (Nebraska) Historical Society ors. In this article I trace the years of Train’s Collections. involvement with the Union Pacifi c Railroad, specifi cally related to the Credit Mobilier of America, his Nebraska real estate empire by the Union Pacifi c Railroad aligned with the through the Credit Foncier of America, fo- hopes of both railroad offi cials and commu- cused in Omaha and Columbus, and his in- nity leaders.5 volvement in promotional excursions along While none of the Union Pacifi c directors the Union Pacifi c tracks. During these excit- traveled to Omaha for the event, they carefully ing years, Train came into contact with sig- planned this event, including participation by nifi cant men already in the process of settling Train, the territorial governor, and the munic- the Great Plains, such as Cyrus McCormick ipal governments of both Omaha and Council and Augustus Kountze. Further, in bringing Bluff s. First, Train, Union Pacifi c chief engi- his cousin George P. Bemis with him to Ne- neer Peter Dey, and others wielded shovel and braska to serve as personal secretary, Train pick while cannons boomed on both sides of launched a long relationship between Bemis the Missouri River.6 Aft er satisfactorily break- and Omaha. ing the ground, someone read congratulatory While Train’s status as a national celebrity letters from such prominent persons as Presi- gave him the opportunity to headline Union dent Abraham Lincoln, Secretaries William Pacifi c events and to take advantage of the Seward and Salmon Chase, and New York City booming real estate business in Nebraska, mayor George Opdyke, followed by speeches neither of these ventures lasted more than fi ve A Madman and a Visionary 37 years. At the end of his life, his connections to for land speculators working alone but on site the Union Pacifi c Railroad Company, Credit over those who created large corporations and Mobilier of America, and Nebraska were little served as absentee landlords.12 Train’s success remembered. In addition, his eccentric, and appears to have come while he was the for- even erratic, personality has led many, from mer; perhaps his losses grew out of his failure Train’s contemporaries to the present day, to to remain in Nebraska. John C. Hudson agrees discount his foresightedness about the future that speculators were necessary for the settle- importance of the Great Plains region, spe- ment of the West.13 cifi cally Nebraska. In light of the sesquicen- Mark Twain’s Colonel Beriah Sellers, while tennial of Congress’s passage of the 1862 Pa- obviously a tool to make his author’s point cifi c Railroad Bill, I argue that George Francis about the corruption of the Gilded Age, does Train and the other boosters of both railroad bear a striking resemblance to actual townsite and territory must be recognized as an infl u- promoters, including George Francis Train. ential, albeit not particularly fi scally success- Since we know Twain was aware of Train, ful, element in the territorial development of this character takes on a special signifi cance the Great Plains. in this study. Hudson refers to Colonel Sellers as a liar, traveling with “a satchel full of other people’s money, on their way to the next town Railroads and Land Speculation to fi nd another batch of suckers.” Ironically, he Most historians agree that railroads played an is the biggest sucker of them all, increasingly infl uential part in settling the West. Within unable to distinguish fact from his fi ction.14 the Great Plains, argue Kurt Kinbacher and According to A. Morton Sakolski, rail- William G. Th omas III, the railroads become road promotion oft en had more to do with the principal agent of that development and the increase of both urban and rural real es- also the key to the modernization of the re- tate values than the profi tability of the rail- gion.10 Shelton Stromquist concurs, adding way itself. Land speculators in the West had that it was the vast federal land grants that no interest in vast acres of wilderness; they placed railroads in a unique position to “pro- wanted control of the land that would become mote emigration, to locate and plat commu- towns, especially those with railway stations. nities, and to endow certain areas with op- To this end, speculators, of whom George portunities for economic development, while Francis Train is an example, began to plan denying opportunities to others.”11 and promote towns before the laying of the Th e relationship between the accumulation fi rst railroad ties.15 J. W. Reps refers to Train and sale of land with the erection of railroad as “the most authentic lunatic” of all those lines is well documented. Ray Allen Billington who sought wealth through land in the West, argues that Frederick Jackson Turner left the while also arguing that he “exhibited genius speculator out of Western prototypes in his for erecting complex fi nancial structures as famous frontier thesis. Billington’s research, well as a talent for enlisting the gullible and although focusing on the colonial period of the greedy in his various enterprises.”16 G. C. U.S. history, applies to Train’s experience as Quiett agrees, calling Train an “internationally well. He fi nds that settlers had more respect known genius in real- estate speculation and 38 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 railroad promotion.” Due to Train’s inside in- equally colorful, but to most people, much formation from Union Pacifi c and Credit Mo- more distasteful human being than Train.21 bilier of America, his Credit Foncier of Amer- In fact, Nebraska banker Edward Creighton ica knew before anyone else where the Union later complained to Union Pacifi c chief en- Pacifi c line would be laid.17 Th is relationship is gineer Grenville M.

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