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 celeb- rity, 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, ground- breaking, 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. Dodge that Durant “cre- refl ected in other land speculators who used ated $250,000 worth of ill- will in Omaha and their close relationships with railroad offi cials Council Bluff s” every time he visited.22 Dodge to benefi t their townsite promotions.18 Hud- later recalled that he suggested Omaha as the son adds that by law, townsites could not be eastern terminus for the fi rst transcontinen- developed along Union Pacifi c’s land grants tal railroad during a meeting in the spring previous to the railroad survey. As soon as the of 1863. Upon Lincoln’s agreement, Dodge survey team passed through, however, land rushed to New York City to visit with the of- was open for settlement.19 fi cers of the fl edging Union Pacifi c Railway Charlyne Berens and Nancy Mitchell add Company, including Durant and Train, who a third element into this partnership: lo- were “greatly encouraged” by his news.23 By cal newspapers. Th ey argue that nineteenth- late October of that year, Train and Durant century newspapers assisted in the settlement hurriedly connived to take control, via stock of the Great Plains by working with railroads purchase, of the Union Pacifi c Railroad and and land speculators to encourage immigra- Telegraph Company.24 Durant quickly be- tion to the region. Boosters of Nebraska and came the vice president of the corporation other Great Plains locales, whether employed while Train remained an off - the- books pro- by a railroad corporation or a newspaper or moter of the railroad, for which he was paid operating on their own as land speculators, handsomely.25 utilized such “self- interested enthusiasm that Aft er attending the groundbreaking, Train their descriptions of and praise for [Nebraska] headed to Washington dc to lobby Congress bordered on fantasy.” George Francis Train, during the debates over new railroad legisla- as I will demonstrate here, defi nitely fi ts this tion. During the spring of 1864, Train daily mold. He oft en submitted so- called advertori- sent scores of telegrams to Durant, directing als to local and Eastern newspapers in which Union Pacifi c operations from his New York he waxed poetic about the benefi ts of living in City offi ce; the fl ow of missives reads much the Great Plains, thereby contributing to the like today’s live blogging or a Twitter feed.26 “unifi ed, cohesive story” created and repeated He encouraged senators to form a select com- by newspaper articles and railroad promotion- mittee to consider an amendatory bill to the al information throughout the United States.20 1862 Pacifi c Railroad Act.27 Th e resulting legis- lation, passed in 1864, benefi ted Train’s friends in the Union Pacifi c by lowering the par value George Francis Train: of their stock, raising the number of available Union Pacifi c Employee? shares, doubling land grants, extending the George Francis Train came to the Union Pa- completion deadline, and relaxing repayment cifi c groundbreaking, his fi rst trip to the requirements.28 Great Plains, via invitation from Durant, an According to Stromquist, railroad compa- A Madman and a Visionary 39 nies made sure someone representing their in- tions of that enterprise,” while other reports terests “perpetually prowled the halls of Con- claimed “not one dollar has ever been paid gress and state legislatures.”29 Richard White to George Francis Train by the gentlemen re- adds that these “strikers,” of whom Train is ferred to.”37 Train’s creativity and energy in the just one, did not appear on railroad company lobbying process during congressional debates payrolls but worked to “move legislation and over the 1864 amendment to the 1862 Pacifi c thus avoid gridlock . . . at a price,” gladly paid Railroad Act made him well worth his cost.38 by these corporations who needed men on the ground to help their interests stay present in Credit Mobilier of America the mind of “virtually every branch of gov- ernment.”30 Specifi cally, Train and his striker While Durant felt a great deal of pressure to compatriots hovered around the congressio- break ground on the Union Pacifi c Railroad, nal committees responsible for funding trans- he was in no hurry to start any actual con- continental railroads. Since these committees struction, because the company’s coff ers stood were not particularly high- ranking, it was not nearly empty. Once again he turned for an diffi cult for railroad executives to make sure answer to George Francis Train, who had the friendly congressmen garnered these appoint- perfect plan.39 While in France the previous ments and directed legislation and monies decade, Train had observed “new methods of toward the railroad corporations.31 Charles fi nance” used by Parisian brothers Emile and Carleton Coffi n of the Boston Journal served Isaac Perrere to fi nance French infrastructure much the same purpose for the Northern Pa- and real estate ventures with limited liability cifi c Railroad, lobbying, lecturing, and writing to stockholders.40 Train decided to introduce articles to support the railroad while never ap- twin corporations, the Credit Mobilier and pearing on the corporation’s payroll.32 Credit Foncier, to the United States.41 Th e Train left Washington dc periodically to Credit Mobilier of America, which fi nanced attend meetings of Union Pacifi c stockhold- track-laying contracts for the Union Pacifi c, ers and directors in Durant’s stead.33 On June quickly outgrew Train’s control and ended in 28, 1864, with the passage of the 1864 Pacifi c a congressional bribery investigation. While Railroad legislation inevitable, Train sent a most of the testimony given in the formal telegram to Durant announcing he was on his inquiry relegates Train to a very minor and way “to the seat of Empire,” most likely refer- innocuous role, historical evidence supports ring to Omaha.34 He charged the Union Pacif- Train’s claim to the concept, name, and pur- ic four thousand dollars for “expenses and ser- chase of the organization that became the vices” during three trips to Omaha.35 Train’s Credit Mobilier of America. services on behalf of Eastern Division, both in Instead of starting a corporation from Kansas and the halls of Congress, earned him scratch, Train suggested the less expensive nearly ten thousand dollars, paid by Durant and quicker route of revamping an existing out of company funds.36 A few years later, ru- Pennsylvania company. Th e incorporators of mors circulated through the press that Durant the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency, chartered in paid Train anywhere between $50,000 and 1859 for vague purposes related to railroad $350,000 “as commissions in earlier negotia- building, never progressed further than sell- 40 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 ing a small amount of stock. Train decided Credit Mobilier. Meanwhile, Credit Mobilier this organization would fi t his purposes and of America headquarters moved from Penn- set about transforming it into the Credit Mo- sylvania to offi ce space at 20 Nassau Street in bilier of America in late February 1864. Oliver New York City, adjoining that of the Union W. Barnes, one of the original incorporators Pacifi c Railroad Company.47 Quickly, Train in the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency, later testi- and Durant made preparations to elect a new fi ed before Congress that Train acted as Du- board of directors. According to Train’s recol- rant’s agent when negotiating the purchase lection of the fi rst stockholders’ meeting, he of the charter from Barnes and his associate, worried that powerful Eastern railroad inter- Charles M. Hall. Train informed Barnes and ests would seize control of the Credit Mobilier. Hall that he and Durant wanted to buy the To ward off this hostile takeover, Train sug- charter “for the purpose of using it in build- gested a slate of offi cers including Union army ing the Union Pacifi c Railroad.” He off ered general John A. Dix as president and Union about $30,000 for the charter and expenses; Pacifi c banker John J. Cisco as treasurer. Th en cementing the deal on March 3, 1864.42 By the he informed those attending the meeting that end of the month, the Pennsylvania Legisla- he held control of 85 percent of the capital.48 ture approved the name change to the Credit No one challenged Train’s claims, and since Mobilier of America.43 the charter stipulated that only business relat- Train claimed to have paid fi ve hundred ing to the Union Pacifi c Railroad Company dollars to facilitate this change.44 Train also was allowed without the permission of those claimed to have purchased the fi rst shares holding three- fourths of the stock, Train’s under the name of his father-in- law, Colonel nominees carried the election.49 George T. M. Davis, for $150,000, but sub- Train followed the losing stockholders scription lists show a much more modest in- out into the street, yelling, “You stand on the vestment on Train’s part and nothing under corners of Wall Street again and call me a Davis’s name.45 Davis came into the transcon- ‘damned Copperhead’ [referring to his affi li- tinental railroad business entirely separate ation with Northern Peace Democrats during from his son- in- law and continued his in- the Civil War]; but don’t forget that I kicked volvement long aft er Train moved on to other $2,000,000 worth of you into the street!” pursuits. Central Pacifi c director Collis Hun- Train later suggested this episode might have tington recruited Davis, already a purveyor of given rise to rumors of his mental instability.50 railroad equipment, early in the conceptual While there is no direct evidence to support stage of the Central Pacifi c Railroad. President this hypothesis, most of Train’s contempo- Lincoln considered Davis a friend and advi- raries viewed him as eccentric, if not erratic, sor on matters concerning the transcontinen- in his behavior. tal railroad.46 As with much of the story of his Part of Train’s value to both the Union life, Train’s account in his fi nal autobiography Pacifi c and the fl edgling Credit Mobilier of rarely matches the historical evidence when America was his ability to pass his enthu- discussing fi duciary matters. siasm on to wealthy potential stockholders Th rough the fall and winter of 1864, Train and directors. One such conquest was Cyrus and Durant sought subscriptions for the McCormick. Train met the agricultural ma- A Madman and a Visionary 41 chinery magnate in the summer of 1865 while Pacifi c Railroad Company, he violated the 1862 taking the water cure then in vogue at the Pacifi c Railroad Act.55 Hazard and Ames, who Hydropathic Institute in New York City, and joined the boards of both Credit Mobilier and wasted no time in extolling the virtues of the Union Pacifi c in 1865, fought Durant’s control Union Pacifi c Railroad and Credit Mobilier of both companies, successfully ousting him of America. Train continued to press Mc- from the Credit Mobilier of America by May Cormick for his fi nancial involvement via let- 1867.56 By the end of the year, the Credit Mo- ters over the next several months. In one he bilier issued its fi rst dividends to stockholders, stroked McCormick’s ego, arguing that the worth about three million dollars, making it robber baron was “just the man to be inter- much more enticing for congressmen to be- ested in the World’s Highway.” come stockholders when approached by Train Train also promised McCormick that this or Ames. Further sweetening the pot, the un- plan was a sure thing since Durant “succeeds likable Durant left the Union Pacifi c the next in Everything [sic] he undertakes.” Further year aft er Generals Ulysses S. Grant and Wil- greasing the wheels, Train suggested McCor- liam T. Sherman instructed him that he must mick visit Durant’s yacht during his vaca- follow the orders of Union Pacifi c chief engi- tion in New York City.51 Revealing the ever- neer Grenville M. Dodge.57 Most likely Train’s political nature of the railroad business, Train hands- on involvement with the railroad busi- reported to McCormick that he would make ness ended with Durant’s departure. a good Union Pacifi c director because he was Widespread confusion about the close per- a Democrat; Train argued that “we have too sonal and business connection between the many Republicans now.”52 McCormick must Credit Mobilier of America and the Union Pa- have liked what he heard because he was in- cifi c Railroad Company intensifi ed questions deed a member of the Union Pacifi c board of Durant’s ethics. Train himself contributed of directors before the end of the year; six to the misunderstanding during a speech in months later he owned 945 shares in Credit Denver in 1867, referring to Credit Mobilier Mobilier and 1,251 shares of the Union Pacifi c and Credit Foncier, respectively: “Th e fi rst Railroad Company. As part of his director- of these credíts owned the Union Pacifi c, the ship in the Union Pacifi c, McCormick was the second the towns.”58 Connecting offi ce space trustee of the company’s land grants; during in New York City and shared directors and his tenure he signed over ten thousand bonds other offi cials made separation between the for that land.53 two organizations even more hazy, leading to While Train billed Durant’s aggressiveness rumors of impropriety. in business as a positive attribute to McCor- Train failed to realize that the names he mick, many powerful Union Pacifi c directors, gave the Credit Mobilier and Credit Foncier such as New England industrialists Oakes would cause confusion and even suspicion Ames and Rowland Hazard, saw Durant’s ac- on the part of many Americans. By the time tions as overly forceful and his business prac- of the congressional investigation, politicians tices questionable.54 When Durant used his used the foreign-sounding name of the Credit control of the Credit Mobilier of America to Mobilier as evidence of corruption.59 On both become the majority stockholder in the Union sides of the Atlantic, the term Credit Mobilier 42 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 became synonymous with scandal and fi nan- of whom was Oakes Ames, were ever pun- cial impropriety.60 Hazard later bemoaned that ished and none of the money involved was Credit Mobilier of America “though innocent ever recovered.66 In truth, most railroads had in itself, was strange and foreign, and therefore a similar “construction” company that was open to suspicion. Its meaning was unknown, “less concerned with moving dirt than with and it was thus capable of having vile mean- moving securities.”67 Economic historian Ed- ings imported into it, and it became possible ward Kirkland argues that while the Credit for the popular mind to attach to it all those Mobilier came to symbolize Gilded Age cor- ideas of fraud and villainy which, having no ruption because of its involvement in politics, existence in fact, could never have been fas- it should be given the credit for “successfully tened to plain ‘Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency.’”61 complet[ing] a road through unknown ter- Th e connection between the Credit Mobil- ritory, occupied largely by hostile Indians, ier of America and the Union Pacifi c Railroad during an era of high prices at a profi t.” He Company ended aft er only 247 miles of road. continues that those involved in the transcon- Hazard claimed that the Credit Mobilier made tinental railroads, “when they refl ected upon very little profi t, insisting that aft er two years their stupendous accomplishments . . . [were] of investment, stockholders, for each one hun- understandably stirred to pride and to an esti- dred dollars invested, had two hundred dol- mate of themselves as benefactors of the com- lars in Union Pacifi c stock, worth not more munity and of the nation.”68 George Francis than twenty dollars, 33.3 Union Pacifi c bonds, Train would certainly agree. worth around thirty dollars, and Credit Mo- Luckily for McCormick, he was abroad bilier stock “considered to be worthless.”62 in 1867 while Durant and the Ames faction Other accounts are much more generous. By squabbled over control of the Credit Mobilier Richard White’s calculations, the Credit Mo- and Union Pacifi c Railroad Company. Th is bilier of America granted dividends of 50 to twist of fate, and a conveniently mislabeled 100 percent a year. Charles Francis Adams, an legal document, allowed McCormick both outspoken critic of Credit Mobilier, and later, to escape involvement in the Credit Mobilier president of Union Pacifi c Railroad Company, scandal and to sell off some of his stock with suggested profi ts nearing 750 percent, for a to- impunity.69 McCormick made no mention of tal of somewhere between eleven million and the scandal in his correspondence, but con- twenty million dollars.63 Robert Riegal places sented to an interview with the Chicago Times his estimate somewhere in the middle, around in May 1873. By the time the scandal broke, 370 percent profi t by 1869.64 McCormick was no longer offi cially, or fi nan- According to economic historian David cially, connected with the Union Pacifi c, but Montgomery, “Train’s grandiose scheme . . . he maintained large amounts of stock in the became the most widely renowned symbol of Credit Mobilier of America.70 Dodge was im- predatory business activities of the decade.”65 plicated in the scandal; he confi ded to a friend A subsequent national scandal in 1873 involv- that the slander must be coming from “Du- ing the bribery of congressmen with Credit rant and the other thieves that I threw out of Mobilier stock resulted in two congressional the company.” He eluded a subpoena for the investigations. Only two congressmen, one congressional investigation of the Credit Mo- A Madman and a Visionary 43 bilier of America and never testifi ed about his served as banker for both the Union Pacifi c involvement in the corporation.71 Railroad Company and the Credit Mobilier of America. Th e Credit Foncier of America in- cluded men who also served on the boards for George Francis Train’s both the Union Pacifi c and Credit Mobilier; Real Estate Empire in addition, Credit Foncier shared headquar- Train appears to have been much more inter- ters with the other two corporations in New ested in the money to be made alongside the York City, leading to confusion about which rail line than from contracts to build the line similarly named company served what pur- itself.72 He threw himself into this western pose. Train encouraged shareholders to sign boom economy by purchasing large amounts a proxy form naming him their “attorney and of land in Nebraska and then promoting agent . . . to vote as our . . . proxy, at any Elec- Omaha as “the young Chicago” and Columbus tion of Directors.” as “the future capital of America—the geo- Further examination of Credit Foncier of graphical center.”73 According to Stromquist, America documents reveals Train’s plans to Chicago was the shining success that other create a real estate empire in the Great Plains. railroad town promoters hope to emulate.74 One such document, printed in New York To raise funds for his real estate empire, Train City in 1866, explained the scheme to buy real again turned to the Perrere brothers for a estate in Omaha and along the Union Pacifi c model, this time aping their land bank, the line, building cottages on alternating lots, in- Credit Foncier, in his own Credit Foncier of cluding 320 quarter lots already laid out in America. Th e Nebraska Territorial Legisla- Omaha.77 Another prospectus focused on Co- ture, overruling the governor’s veto, chartered lumbus and its future importance, “the nation- the Credit Foncier of America with Train, al point for an important station.” It included his father-in- law G. T. M. Davis, and Omaha a geographical map of the area, claiming to be banker Augustus Kountze as its incorpora- “surrounded by the fi nest agricultural lands in tors on February 15, 1866.75 Kountze and his the world.” Th e author of the prospectus, al- three brothers came to Omaha very early in most certainly George Francis Train, reassures the town’s settlement, fi rst in the freight busi- his readers of the soundness of the investment ness but quickly moving on to banking. Th eir by adding that the Credit Mobilier of Amer- Kountze Brothers Bank became the First Na- ica owned land just outside the city, as did tional Bank of Omaha in 1863.76 “leading Generals and Statesmen.” Train also While the House of Rothschild fi nanced encouraged prospective Credit Foncier stock- the original Credit Foncier, Train chose to take holders to act quickly, before land prices rose. a more diverse route. His version required one To increase profi ts and endear itself to possible hundred subscribers, allowed only one $1,000 immigrants, the Credit Foncier sold “alternate share each, at no personal liability, for total lots at a minimal price to the public.”78 In 1868, capital of $100,000. Train served as president, when Train founded the suff ragist periodical with his cousin, George Pickering Bemis, as Revolution with Susan B. Anthony and Eliza- secretary, and John J. Cisco and Son of New beth Cady Stanton, he included in its mast- York City functioning as banker; Cisco also head a demand for “Th e Credit Foncier and 44 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014

Fig. 2. Cozzens Hotel, Omaha, ca. 1867. Courtesy of the Douglas County (Nebraska) Historical Society Collections.

Credit Mobilier system, or Capital Mobilized argued that while land speculators have been to Resuscitate the South and our Mining In- vilifi ed, few realize that “[t]he creators of these terests and to People the Country from Ocean ‘paper towns’ would not have been disap- to Ocean!”79 Th e exaggerated language used pointed had their broadsides turned out to be in the Credit Foncier’s printed materials is accurate predictions. Th eir goal was making similar to promotions of other town- jobbing money, but many of them also came to believe companies.80 in their own dreams.”82 Train, much like the According to Walter Prescott Webb, land speculators Hudson summarizes, invested his speculators played an important role in set- own money (as well as much, much more of tling the West alongside the rail lines, encour- other people’s money) in his Omaha real es- aging immigrants to travel to new lands and tate ventures and truly believed in the success promoting the importance of these future of Omaha, Columbus, and the Credit Foncier towns.81 Although Train’s speculating activity of America. postdates John C. Hudson’s study by about a Searching for investors for his Credit Fon- decade, he still fi ts the historian’s description cier, Train returned to Cyrus McCormick. of an optimistic Yankee, one of the “individu- Train insisted that Credit Foncier, while “en- als who anticipated that their eff orts would tirely independent of the Pacifi c and Credit pave the way for what was to come.” Hudson Mobilier,” enjoyed a closeness with offi cials of A Madman and a Visionary 45 the two that gave it “the advantage of know- York Tribune correspondent Albert D. Rich- ing where Station Buildings and Towns will ardson visited Omaha, already eight times be built” along the tracks.83 Train’s cousin and larger than it had been when the Union Pa- secretary, Bemis, also contacted McCormick cifi c broke ground. Richardson was impressed with information about the fl edgling land with the Credit Foncier, a company to which speculation company: “As towns will be start- he attributed every power “save that of re- ed at every station on the U.P., the idea [be- constructing the late rebel States.” He saw the hind the Credit Foncier] is but in its infancy, corporation’s erection of cottages in full swing and by reinvesting the profi ts every forty miles and reported that Train owned fi ve hundred where the station is built & town started, leav- acres at $175 an acre.91 Union Pacifi c employee ing the alternate lots of land to increase in val- Silas Seymour also commented on how heav- ue, the man who puts down his one thousand ily the Credit Foncier was investing in Omaha dollars now can judge of the harvest he will in 1866.92 reap.”84 McCormick took the bait, buying his A map of the city (Fig. 3) prepared by lo- share and becoming a director of the Credit cal surveyor and real estate agent Oscar F. Foncier of America.85 Davis (who, by 1872, worked as the Union Pa- Even before the Credit Foncier got off the cifi c’s land commissioner) published the same ground, George Francis Train adopted Oma- year shows four hundred unimproved acres ha as his new hometown, purchasing land of George Francis Train’s land in Section 27, and ten buildings, and building the Cozzens at the southeastern corner of town, split by Hotel within a few short years (Fig. 2). He Bellvue Road. A small portion of this land is thus became one of the fi rst land speculators inside the corporation boundary line. Adjoin- to cash in on the Union Pacifi c’s arrival, per- ing this unimproved land is the Credit Foncier haps even starting the boom economy.86 Train subdivision, stretching from Eighth Street on purchased the land known as the Credit Fon- the west to Second Avenue on the east. Pierce cier Addition, or Train Town, from the Koun- Street is the last street to the north, about one tze brothers and Samuel Rogers in October block from the subdivision, while Pine Street 1866, the largest land purchase in Nebraska to is the southern border. Th is property is made that point.87 On January 1, 1866, Train wrote up of just under two hundred lots covering a check from Durant’s account to Augustus twenty- four city blocks. A tract titled “G. F. Kountze for $8,708.80. Th e check, which Train Train’s Residence” fi ts between his other two postdated forty days, does not include any properties, undivided but covering roughly reason for the payment, but it might possibly four city blocks stretching south from the be a down payment on the Credit Foncier Ad- corporation boundary to Chestnut Street, be- dition.88 Once the land had been divided into tween Sixth and Eighth Streets. town lots, Train brought in ten frame houses Henry Stanley, a well-known travel writer, built in Chicago, complete with brick chim- visited Omaha in September 1867 on the way neys and foundations.89 According to the 1866 to a conference of Native American leaders. Omaha city directory, the fi rst for the young Stanley complained of the Omaha dust “not- town, Train worked as speculator and lived at withstanding . . . its George Francis Train.” He Twelft h and Douglas.90 Th at same year New was not completely unimpressed, however, 46 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014

Fig. 3. Inset of 1866 map of Omaha. Courtesy of the Douglas County (Nebraska) Historical Society Collections.

referring to Omaha as “a wide-awake, ener- reporter did not doubt Train or the “future getic town.”93 In his travelogue, he mentions greatness of this City of Omaha.”96 Th e same that he left town through Train Town, “a sub- year, Charles Collins dedicated his Omaha city urb which is fi lled with numerous cottages, directory to Train, who had already moved on; erected by the ‘Credit Foncier’ of America, of however, addresses of “Train Town” appear in which George Francis Train is the President.”94 the listings, indicating that at least some of the Two months later, during a speech in Denver, Credit Foncier cottages had occupants.97 Train bragged about the sale of six thousand Train did not limit his Nebraska real estate lots in Omaha for fi ve hundred dollars apiece. empire to Omaha; he also purchased land, According to the speculator extraordinaire, through the Credit Foncier of America, at this “triumph of instinct over science . . . was several spots along the Union Pacifi c tracks, a fair beginning for a fortune, in his humble most notably in Columbus, a tiny stop nine- opinion.”95 ty miles northwest of Omaha.98 Train picked Two years later a New York Times reporter, Columbus as the most natural capital for the visiting the city as part of a Union Pacifi c– United States because, he claimed, it was ten sponsored excursion to the end of the line, miles from the center of the United States, referred to Omaha as Train’s home, “or at least within one mile of the center of the earth, the place where he has laid the foundation of and exactly in the center of the universe. In that fortune of thirty million, which he says preparation for the national government’s ar- he will be worth in ten years from now.” Th e rival, Train purchased eight hundred acres in A Madman and a Visionary 47

Columbus, named it the Capital Addition, and tively unimportant to the territorial develop- laid it out in lots.99 Richardson accompanied ment of the Great Plains.106 Union Pacifi c offi cials to Columbus in 1866. Train’s larger plan for a real estate empire He reported that Train and the Credit Fon- disintegrated as Nebraska gained statehood cier intended Columbus to be “a great city . . . and the Union Pacifi c decided to use their capital of Nebraska, and perhaps of the United own Town Lots Division instead of his Credit States.”100 Seymour also found evidence of the Foncier of America to sell off their volumi- Credit Foncier in Columbus, where the com- nous land grants. According to Union Pacifi c pany promised “through its far- seeing and employee Sam Reed, Train believed “he was enterprising managers, to add much to its fu- sacrifi ced by the railroad men,” who made a ture growth and prosperity.”101 A newspaper substantial profi t off the development of Oma- reporter participating in one of the end- of- the ha, most noticeably the rows of workmen’s line excursions also described Columbus and cottages in Train Town.107 Train’s vision for a its future importance: “Looking forward to string of towns stretching along the line of the the time when its central position may make transcontinental railroad from Omaha to San it the capital of the nation, an organization Francisco was “only partially realized.”108 Th is of New-York capitalists, the Credit Foncier of did not mean, however, that his idea had no which george francis train is President, merit. Other land speculators, perhaps those has purchased here, and now holds for spec- with more focus and better mental health, de- ulative purposes, fi ve or six thousand lots of veloped towns and way stations all along the land, or 688 acres.”102 Union Pacifi c route.109 Upon a visit to the town in the fall of 1867, Train made plans for another “Credit Foncier End-of- the- Line Excursions hotel for some rising Cozzens to rent” match- ing his Cozzens Hotel already in operation One of the ways in which Train advertised in Omaha.103 Th e Union Pacifi c more realis- the Credit Foncier’s presence in Omaha, Co- tically promised the residents of Columbus lumbus, and elsewhere along the rail line that the town was to become a freight depot was through participation in Union Pacifi c– with repair shops, a roundhouse, and other sponsored end-of- the- line excursions. Th e railroad-related ventures. For this purpose, Union Pacifi c Railroad Company sponsored Durant purchased valuable property and many end- of- the- line excursions for journal- gained rights to land for a depot and the ists, legislators, and other interested parties. right- of- way in most of the county for the Th ese excursions gave the Union Pacifi c the Union Pacifi c’s purposes.104 Later that year, opportunity to highlight its progress, with with the achievement of statehood for Ne- goals of eliciting favorable reporting and leg- braska, Train’s goal for Columbus to become islating from the participants. According to the state capital dissipated when voters chose Sig Mickelson, excursions were one form of Lancaster, quickly renamed Lincoln, as the advertising that “focus[ed] the attention of the seat of government.105 Despite Train’s delu- nation on the railroad . . . creat[ing] an inter- sions of grandeur found within the Credit est in the enterprise that made the public more Foncier brochures, Columbus remained rela- receptive to the land advertising that was to 48 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 come later.” Mickelson observes that news- hunt for the Union Pacifi c offi cials. Ames, Du- papermen participated in excursions to such rant, Train, and others traveled in wagons un- a degree that they were obviously among the til the party found one hundred buff alo.115 At “most satisfactory” options for guaranteeing that point, Durant, Train, and another Union newspaper coverage.110 In addition, “modern Pacifi c offi cial mounted horses and joined the homesteaders” were likely to join these excur- hunt while the others remained with the wag- sions as a way to “gain claims to their liking.”111 ons.116 Durant shot a buff alo with a revolver. George Francis Train, who attended and Once they completed the buff alo hunt, these most likely helped plan several of these excur- men asked their guides if they could go fi nd sions, shared the aspirations of Union Pacifi c hostile Sioux warriors and watch an Indian offi cials; he also hoped to develop his real es- battle, but Major North demurred.117 Th at tate empire by showcasing Columbus as an evening, the Pawnee returned to camp with a up-and- coming frontier city. Train almost Sioux scalp and performed a war dance.118 always made at least one speech during these During an excursion of Union Pacifi c offi - excursions, both of his own volition and as the cials in October 1867, two Pawnee chiefs, Spot- mouthpiece for the Union Pacifi c Railroad, ted Tail and Big Mouth, presented the offi cials refuting the claims of Riegal, Mickelson, and with “the freedom of the plains.” Pawnee war- others that the Northern Pacifi c Railroad was riors later performed a war dance.119 In 1880 the fi rst to extensively rely on public speak- the Pawnee Scouts went to work for Buff alo ers.112 On one such occasion, Train waxed Bill Cody, a friend of Major North, and his poetic about the “common destiny with the Wild West show, repeating the performance great West being clasped in an iron embrace they gave guests of Union Pacifi c excursions by mutual labor and enterprise.”113 Train’s lan- all over the world. Indeed, Buff alo Bill staged guage for both his townsite promotions and the fi rst full dress rehearsal of his Wild West end-of- the- line excursions fi ts the dominant show in Columbus before formally opening in tone of frontier literature at the time— one, Omaha a few days later.120 according to Webb, “of adventure and un- One of the most elaborate of these excur- usualness.” Since frontier experiences tended sions celebrated the progress of the Union Pa- to be fl eeting, subsequent generations longed cifi c tracks to the One Hundredth Meridian. to participate in “its hardships and suff erings Train, whose participation in the trip belied with a feeling of vicarious adventure.”114 his desire to promote both the railroad and his One of the ways in which the Union Pacifi c real estate empire, covered the event for the provided its excursionists with an authentic Chicago Journal; several other papers across western experience in the Great Plains was the nation printed his reports as well. Th e ex- through carefully choreographed participa- cursion left Chicago, heading by train to the tion by the Pawnee Scouts under the com- Missouri River, on Monday, October 29, 1866. mand of Major Frank North. During an When the train arrived at the eastern banks excursion arranged for Senator Ben Wade, of the Missouri River, fi reworks and cannons Major North, accompanied by his U.S. Cav- welcomed them to their ferries, where they alry troops and Pawnee Scouts, attended the spent the night.121 excursion at Fort Kearny, including a buff alo Train grew even more excited as the steam- A Madman and a Visionary 49 boats passed into Nebraska and Omaha came three hundred thousand dollars by your hav- into view: “Th e land of my adoption— land of ing concluded to sit on it.”126 future promise—great city of the nineteenth Th e next morning, as the excursion took a century!”122 A great welcome met the excur- tour of Columbus, the Pawnee from the pre- sionists when they arrived in Omaha. Th e vious night reappeared from one direction governor welcomed them to the territory; while what appeared to be Sioux warriors, but both the mayor and a representative of the actually were all from the same Native group, Board of Trade did the same for the city. Th e came into view. Aft er an impressive hour-long excursionists enjoyed a carriage ride around display of riding and shooting guns and ar- the city, passing by the Credit Foncier lots, of rows in a mock battle, the ladies of the party 127 course, and then to a ball hosted by the city, presented the victorious warriors with gift s. which Train argued had “a basket full of lovely Seymour, a Union Pacifi c offi cial and member women.” Early the next morning, two hundred of the excursion, did not enjoy the Indian “at- excursionists boarded a train and headed west tack” the following morning, as he perceived amid whistles, fl ags, bugles, and boat horns. that Durant and others “were only making Th e excursion stopped for the night at Co- them dance and perform this most unique and savage morning serenade for their own lumbus. Train’s reference to it as a “brilliant particular amusement.”128 Durant arranged sight” described not only the city of illumi- the Native exhibitions involving around one nated tents arranged for the trip but also his hundred Pawnee warriors through Union Pa- pride in the city he believed he was building.123 cifi c offi cials stationed in Columbus, although Aft er dinner, more cannons, bugles, and bells Dodge later attempted to take credit for the sounded, but to the excursionists’ great sur- raid.129 If Train assisted Durant in planning the prise and alarm, Pawnee war whoops joined Indian demonstrations, as is highly possible, it the din. To calm the frightened travelers, Du- can be surmised that while Train wanted the rant explained that the Pawnees were merely excursionists to view Columbus as an up-and- entertaining the excursion party with a tradi- coming civilized city, he also wanted to give tional war dance. During the night, Train gave the visitors a taste of “authentic” life on the a short speech to a group of prominent Chica- Great Plains frontier. goans, whom he referred to as “all Credit Fon- Aboard the train once more, the excursion 124 cier millionaires.” Th is speech, as reported continued west, past the One Hundredth Me- by Train, clearly identifi es his pride in Co- ridian to Camp Durant, another twenty- fi ve lumbus and plans for its future. “Caucasians! miles west and the end of the Union Pacifi c fellow-noblemen, citizens and horses (this last tracks (Fig. 4). Th is tent city, complete with was addressed to the Indians’ ponies on either printing press, telegraph offi ce, barbershop, side)—welcome to the Credit Foncier prop- saloon, and opera house welcomed the ex- erty. Th ese seven thousand lots you sit on be- cursionists for the night. Th e evening’s enter- long to the Credit Foncier.”125 He continued by tainment included a ball, concerts, and many admitting the importance of making Colum- speeches. Train served as voluntary master of bus a stop on the excursion: “Th is was once ceremonies and, it would seem, the star at- a howling wilderness— but now I shall make traction when Professor Wells, a phrenologist, Fig. 4. One- half of a stereoscope image. George Francis Train (seated) with Th omas C. Durant and Wilhelmina Davis Train behind him at the One Hundredth Meridian, Nebraska Territory, 1866. Courtesy of the Denver Public Library, Western History Collection, z- 3310.

50 A Madman and a Visionary 51 delivered a lecture using Train, “the humorist he assigned management of the Credit Fon- of the party,” as his example.130 At midnight, cier of America to Bemis, who went several around the bonfi re, many of the excursionists years without drawing his annual salary of thanked Durant and the other Union Pacifi c fi ft een hundred dollars plus expenses because executives for arranging the trip. When his the Credit Foncier’s accounts stood empty.136 turn arrived, Durant asked Train to speak on Th is also signaled the end of this relationship his behalf.131 Th is example demonstrates the with the Union Pacifi c as the company’s man- hopes of Train and Union Pacifi c offi cials that agement increasingly worried about his men- his status as both national celebrity and local tal health.137 businessman would prove fi nancially benefi - cial to all parties involved. Questions of Mental Illness Th e next morning the excursionists hunted antelope and buff alo, watched the workmen Even in the 1860s, people noticed Train’s lay track, and posed for photographs taken strange ways and wondered about his sanity. by Professor Carbutt of Chicago. Th e pictures Travel writer Albert Richardson, in recalling were both souvenirs and for use in publica- his 1866 visit to Omaha, mused that Train “[c] tions as far distant as the Illustrated London uriously combin[ed] keen sagacity with wild News. Th e excursionists also printed their enthusiasm, a man who might have built the own newspaper, the Railway Pioneer, in camp, pyramids or been confi ned in a straight jacket listing participants including Durant, Train, for eccentricities, according to the age he lived and reporters.132 Th e Union Pacifi c Railroad in.” At that time, Train told Richardson that Company wanted extensive press coverage of “since [I] began to make money, people no this event. George Francis Train, at once both longer pronounce [me] crazy!”138 By the early the subject and author of newspaper reports, 1870s, however, Train’s fi nancial empire began raised the visibility of this and other Union to crumble and his mental capacities came Pacifi c excursions. into serious question. Headed back east on the line, the excur- In December 1872 one of Train’s controver- sionists stopped at the One Hundredth Merid- sial publications brought him to the attention ian for additional photographs and speeches of New York City’s self-appointed arbiter of before boarding the train once more.133 Th e Victorian morals, Anthony Comstock. He and party witnessed an evening prairie fi re, ar- John Wesley Nichols, a twenty- three- year- old ranged by Durant, covering fi ft y miles before photographer and Train’s campaign manager, arriving back in Omaha for a midnight sup- faced charges of “publishing an obscene and per.134 As the excursion drew to a close and the blasphemous sheet called the Train Ligue,” group departed Nebraska, Train waxed poetic which, incidentally, was Train’s presidential about the journey. “Good by, Credit Mobili- campaign newspaper.139 Train started the Train er, good by, Durant, good by, Credit Foncier, Ligue in Omaha, where local offi cials quickly good by, Omaha!”135 suppressed it. Undaunted, Train moved his About a year later, George Francis Train publication to New York City, where he pro- did say goodbye to Omaha, to Nebraska, and duced fi ve more issues before his arrest. Train to the Union Pacifi c Railroad. When he left , quickly found himself arraigned and await- 52 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 ing trial in New York City’s infamous Tombs proceedings, ordering the case to return to the prison. By the end of the year, news of Train’s county court the following day.142 arrest reached the West Coast. A report in the By early April, the New York county courts San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin stated also determined that Train’s mental competen- that “though George Francis Train failed to cy must be addressed before he could be tried become President, he has accomplished the on the obscenity charges.143 Th e proceedings next dearest wish of his heart in getting into designed to determine Train’s mental compe- an American bastille [referring to Paris’s Bas- tency began on Tuesday, April 15, 1873.144 When tille prison made famous during the French Warden Johnston of the Tombs prison took Revolution].”140 the stand, he testifi ed that he had known Train Train continued to refuse bail and re- for about a decade and “considered him a great mained in the Tombs until his trial began in American humbug” whose behavior had not March 1873.141 On March 28, Train appeared changed in the time the men knew each other. before the New York Supreme Court, which Johnston did not think Train was insane, but was packed with a crowd “in anticipation that “rather . . . one who desired to advertise him- the ‘great sensationalist’ would make himself self at the expense of the public, or more par- as conspicuous as usual.” Th e judge deter- ticularly the Press, without paying anything for mined that Train’s obscenity case belonged it.”145 As part of the proceedings on April 24, back in the county court and then allowed Train’s attorney, Clark Bell, presented a short Train, “profusely adorned with fl owers,” to biography of Train’s life in which he empha- make an “energetic, though rambling” state- sized Train’s organization of the Union Pacifi c ment about the need for ventilation in the Railroad and the Credit Foncier.146 Tombs and that the rumors of his sanity were On April 30, Train’s defense team called “a mere hoax” designed to force him out of several more witnesses who could testify to prison and keep him from suing the district Train’s sanity. Th e fi rst of these witnesses, Au- attorney for false imprisonment. He declared gustus Kountze, was a banker from Omaha. that “they had already taken away his liberty, He met Train in connection with the Union and now conspired to rob him of man’s most- Pacifi c Railroad in 1863 and had multiple in- prized treasure, his faculties of mind.” teractions with Train regarding the railroad, When the judge reprimanded Train for the Credit Foncier of America, and Nebraska his “irrelevant” statement, since he was in real estate. Kountze testifi ed that he consid- court for obscenity, not questions of his men- ered Train “eccentric, but never supposed him tal health, Train retorted that “if his Honor to be insane.” He also trusted Train’s business had been fourteen weeks in prison he might, sense, as he had over the previous decade for perhaps, postpone the other business for a many transactions involving large sums of while.” Th e judge’s smile encouraged Train money. New Jersey politician James Scoville to continue. He argued that “the entire Press also testifi ed that he had known Train quite was subsidized . . . and that, sane or insane, well for about ten years. Like Kountze, Scoville he wanted a trial, and would not be forced out also considered Train “a peculiar man” but an of prison without it.” Aft er several more min- “excellent business man.” When the prosecu- utes, the judge cut Train off and adjourned the tion asked Scoville if he had volunteered as a A Madman and a Visionary 53 witness, he replied that he had not, but he had Th e pandemonium continued as the as- sent Train a telegram in which he said he did sistant district attorney attempted to formally not consider Train “as crazy as the Credit Mo- close the proceedings while Bell repeatedly bilizer [sic] Congressmen.”147 Th e trial ended insisted that the individual jurors be heard. in early May when the jury returned aft er just Th e judge ignored Bell and ordered the clerk a few minutes of deliberation, having deter- to enter the verdict, also ordering that Train mined that George Francis Train was “sane, be committed to an asylum for the insane. and responsible for his acts.” Th e courtroom Upon this declaration, the courtroom erupted erupted in applause and congratulations from into further chaos. Train’s attorneys protested both the audience and the jury.148 that they had witnesses who would testify to Train remained in the Tombs prison, de- Train’s sanity, while Train, recovering a bit spite the eff orts of his legal counsel and a from his shock, began to speak. Th e judge judge to have him released on his own re- banged the gavel, yelling, “I don’t want to hear cognizance, until his obscenity trial began on anything from you.” Train continued to pro- Friday, May 16, 1873.149 Th e following Mon- test, arguing that he received no trial aft er fi ve day, Nichols testifi ed that he was Train’s agent months in jail. He moved for the judge’s im- for the Train Ligue, selling the newspaper on peachment, to the delight of the audience. Th e commission.150 In an abrupt about- face from court adjourned and Train returned to the the previous defense strategy, Bell, Train’s at- Tombs while the clerk drew up commitment torney, now claimed Train’s great mental ac- papers sending Train to the State Lunatic Asy- tivity constituted insanity at the time he wrote lum at Utica in the custody of the New York the materials in question, indicating that all City sheriff until “thence discharged accord- men of Train’s “great intellect were subject to ing to law.”152 fi ts of insanity.”151 At the end of May, one of Train’s lawyers Later that morning, when Bell moved for fi led a petition on his behalf before the New a verdict of not guilty on the basis of insan- York Supreme Court requesting that Train be ity, the prosecutor agreed. Th e judge then di- released from “confi nement as a lunatic.” In the rected the jury to acquit Train of the charges document, Train swore to be “of sound mind” since both sides believed him to be insane. and stated that further incarceration would be Bell insisted that the wording be “not guilty” a “gross, wicked, and cruel injustice” since he and the judge so ordered. Th e jury foreman, was an educated man of “liberal attainments upon being asked by the clerk how the jury and great mental capacity and power.” Train found the defendant, answered “in rather be- also claimed he owned one million dollars in wildered manner” that the jury found Train real estate in Omaha, as well as fi ve thousand not guilty by reason of insanity. Th e audience dollars’ worth in Columbus, Nebraska, and a in the courtroom began tittering, and Train similar amount in Council Bluff s, Iowa. Train both blushed and paled, remaining “absolute- also insisted that he still had an unsettled ly dumb with astonishment.” Th e jurors also claim for a million dollars against the Union seemed confused, and Bell asked that the jury Pacifi c Railroad Company and the presiden- be polled individually. Th e judge refused his cy of the Credit Foncier of America, “a large motion and discharged the jury. moneyed corporation . . . in which some sixty 54 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 leading capitalists of the United States are in- fered to sell off half his fi ve thousand lots and terested with him.” All these business opera- the Cozzens Hotel in Omaha via lottery. He tions required his signature, which he could planned to sell 250,000 tickets for ten dollars not do if declared legally insane. Instead, the each, adding two and a half million dollars to court would appoint a committee to manage his purse.158 Since all the lots Train claimed his estate and business aff airs, charging exorbi- to own most likely had been repossessed by tant fees. Th erefore, he requested an interview this time, it is unlikely such an auction oc- to determine his sanity so that he might return curred. Th e Cozzens Hotel was tied up in le- to his responsibilities. Tombs warden Johnston gal troubles of its own at this point, but was and the prison’s physician both certifi ed Train’s still offi cially owned by the Credit Foncier of “perfect sanity and harmlessness.”153 Later that America. month, Train appeared in court again to dis- Twenty acres of Train’s Nebraska land went cuss his mental state. Th is time the jury im- to auction a year later to pay thirty-fi ve hun- mediately returned with the opinion that Train dred dollars in back taxes and interest. An was sane at the time of his trial, sane when he irritated Train told a New York reporter that fi led his petition, sane at the present time, and he “tired of being a pauper millionaire, and that “it [was] perfectly safe and proper to dis- consider[ed] Omaha a fraud.”159 In order to charge him.”154 pay the mortgages on the property held by Th e state of New York offi cially released the First National Bank of Omaha and Samuel Train, who immediately boarded a ship for Rogers, the Credit Foncier Addition went to Europe on May 30, 1873.155 Not only did Train auction in August 1875. Th ese eight hundred escape further questions of his sanity by head- acres, now worth double the original purchase ing to Europe, he also eluded a subpoena (by price of seventy thousand dollars, drew a large a mere hour) from Connecticut regarding crowd to the Omaha courthouse, but an in- a lawsuit related to the Credit Mobilier of junction attained by Credit Foncier stock- America.156 holders stopped the sale.160 Train’s legal diffi culties put his fi nancial Train’s fi nancial situation continued to situation in permanent decline. For the rest worsen in early 1876 when his cousin and sec- of his life, Train sought to collect claims and retary, George P. Bemis, won a suit in an Oma- hang on to real estate assets in Nebraska, Il- ha court against the Credit Foncier for twelve linois, and elsewhere. Train had spent the thousand dollars in salary due him. Bemis previous decade “purchasing” real estate on next planned to sue Train personally for ap- promises, ious, and other people’s money. proximately forty thousand dollars’ back pay Since his work for the Union Pacifi c Railroad he earned as Train’s secretary.161 Later the same and Credit Mobilier of America was off the month Train appeared in New York’s Marine books, Train had to rely on lawsuits, several of Court to offi cially list his assets. During the which dated back to the late 1860s, to receive proceedings, Train claimed to “no business” funds he believed the corporations owed him and that he gave most of the proceeds from for services rendered.157 his recent presidential campaign lectures to Th e fi rst sign of change in Train’s fi nancial charity. He also insisted that his clothes and portfolio came in August 1873 when he of- a watch worth one hundred dollars made up A Madman and a Visionary 55 his personal property, but that he still awaited brother of the aforementioned Augustus, was settlements totaling nearly fourteen million the current owner of most of the property in dollars in claims against several of his business question; he insisted he held an offi cial title endeavors, both offi cial and unoffi cial, includ- and the court decided in his favor.167 ing the Union Pacifi c Railroad Company, real Another ten years passed before Train re- estate in Omaha and Chicago, and for false opened the suit, claiming the Omaha land was imprisonment against the City of New York now worth twenty million dollars. Bemis and during the time between his arrest and trials other friends of Train supported his case.168 in 1872– 73.162 As late as 1898, Train still had Bell, continu- Th e Marine Court appointed a receiver to ing to argue that Train’s insanity invalidated manage any further assets Train could “man- any foreclosure, working to settle the thirty- age to secure.”163 While Train had been declared million-dollar lawsuit concerning his Omaha sane by a jury, testimony of multiple medical lots.169 Even if Train did still own land in Oma- professionals declaring him to be suff ering ha, it would not have been worth the amount from “monomania” or “partial” insanity al- he claimed toward the end of his life, at least lowed the courts to judge him “incapable of partially due to both the fi nancial insolvency managing his fi nances,” with earlier, similar of the Union Pacifi c Railroad Company and cases as precedent.164 Th is act signaled the end its decision to move the eastern terminus of of George Francis Train as a businessman of the Union Pacifi c across the Missouri River to any nature. Now, not only did the American Council Bluff s, Iowa.170 public view him as a lunatic and his opinions irrelevant, but his identity as fi nancier and Train Returns to Nebraska business genius had been stripped away as well. Articles regarding Train’s assets appeared With no business to conduct, estranged from in both New York and St. Louis, the latter of two of his three adult children, mourning the which mocked that this amount could “not be loss of two loved ones in 1877 (his wife, Wil- depended upon” since Train “was always pain- helmina Davis Train, and his friend Brigham fully modest in estimating his own worth.”165 Young), and disheartened at what he consid- An article in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat a ered society’s rejection of his genius, Train few weeks later described Train as “busted” decided to try something new— sit on a park and the city of Omaha in similar shape with bench in New York City’s Madison Square his infl uence removed and the U.S. Supreme Park and play with the local children. For Court’s order to move the Union Pacifi c termi- the subsequent two decades, Train refused to nal across the river to Council Bluff s, Iowa.166 speak to adults and retreated further into his In May 1887 Bemis again brought a suit on own world. Train’s behalf in an Omaha courtroom for six Omaha did not entirely forget George Fran- thousand lots in Omaha. Train, in Tacoma, cis Train. In 1881 an Omaha reporter insisted Washington Territory, at the time, valued the that Omaha owed Train thanks for “much of lots at ten million dollars and claimed they her present prosperity” since “he spared nei- had been taken from him when the New York ther time nor money in advancing her inter- court declared him insane. Herman Kountze, ests, and probably advertised her advantages 56 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 and prospective growth more than any man or Nebraska, Omaha, Columbus, the Union Pa- set of men who ever resided within her lim- cifi c, the Credit Mobilier of America, and the its.”171 Members of the press across the coun- Credit Foncier of America in his last autobi- try also attributed Omaha’s success to George ography, published less than two years before Francis Train, calling him “the prophet of his death in 1904. At that time, he insisted that Omaha’s future greatness” who “did much to he still owned fi ve thousand lots in Omaha make her good points known to the world.”172 worth thirty million dollars and that Omaha’s Train made one fi nal visit to Omaha in 1893 prosperity connected “directly to the Union in an attempt to connect his new pet projects, Pacifi c Railway and to the other enterprises children and World’s Fairs, to his previous in- that I organized in the West.” In the preface volvement in the building of the Great Plains. of this memoir, Train claimed to have created When the World’s Fair came to Chicago, Train the Credit Mobilier of America, with which came up with the idea of an Omaha day. He he built the Union Pacifi c Railroad. He also traveled to the city, spending a week seeking insisted that three generations of his family permission to take fi ve thousand children to continued to live off its profi ts. Train does not Chicago for the day. Bemis, mayor of Omaha mention the school in his autobiography, but at the time, agreed to look into the plan.173 this Omaha legacy, of which he should have Train asked the railway passenger agent, an been the most proud, still stands.177 old acquaintance, to give the children special George Francis Train’s participation in the rates, but he refused. When Train argued that building of the Great Plains, centering on hogs traveled cheaper, the agent replied that the interconnected economies of the Union the children could have the same rate as the Pacifi c Railroad and the burgeoning cities hogs if they would accept the same accom- of Omaha and Columbus, lasted less than modations as the swine. In a rage, Train thun- fi ve years. Like many others who came West dered: “I made the town and I’ll break it!”174 aft er the Civil War, Train sought wealth and Bemis and a dozen children escorted Train to personal fulfi llment. Also like scores of other the depot where he caught a train for Chicago. men and women, his short-lived success left Train never returned to Omaha, disillusioned him frustrated and he moved on to other en- by the fact that he no longer commanded at- deavors. Looking back some 150 years, we can tention from the city he built or the railroad now see that Train left more of a legacy than he brought to it.175 it appeared during his lifetime. Th e encour- Two years later, Omaha, perhaps in large agement he gave would-be investors, such as part due to Bemis’s two terms as mayor, built a Cyrus McCormick, to see the future impor- school named aft er Train. Th e red brick Train tance of the Great Plains benefi ted Nebraska School opened in the Credit Foncier Addition and the surrounding areas long aft er Train’s with just under four hundred students in the name faded into obscurity. While Train rela- fall of 1895. Th e land and the building com- tively quickly lost claim to his Nebraska real bined cost the city about thirty-fi ve thousand estate empire, the emigrants he predicted dollars.176 would come did pour into Omaha, many of His bitterness dissipated somewhat with them settling into the southeastern neighbor- age, George Francis Train spoke fondly of hood still referred to as Train Town, in which A Madman and a Visionary 57 a red brick school still bears his name. Train 14. John C. Hudson, Plains Country Towns (Min- deserves to rise from his obscurity, shake off neapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985), 47. 15. A. Morton Sakolski, Th e Great American Land the fetters of his “brilliant buff oonery,” and Bubble: Th e Amazing Story of Land- Grabbing (New return to a place among the men and women York: Johnson Reprint Corp., 1966), 277, 288. whose optimistic vision and whole- hearted 16. J. W. Reps, Th e Making of Urban America: A support encouraged the development of the History of City Planning in the United States (Princ- Great Plains.178 eton nj: Princeton University Press, 1992), 400- 402. 17. G. C. Quiett, Th ey Built the West: An Epic of Rails and Cities (New York: D. Appleton- Century, Notes 1939), 84, 85. 18. Hudson, Plains Country Towns, 70; 1. R. W. Howard, Th e Great Iron Trail: Th e Story of Stromquist; Generation of Boomers, 17. the First Transcontinental Railroad (New York: Put- 19. Hudson, “Towns of the Western Railroads,” 44. nam, 1962), 164; Lawrence H. Larsen, Barbara J. Cot- 20. Charlyne Berens and Nancy Mitchell, “Parallel trell, Harl A. Dalstrom, and Kay Calamé Dalstrom, Tracks, Same Terminus: Th e Role of Nineteenth- Upstream Metropolis: An Urban Biography of Omaha Century Newspapers and Railroads in the Settlement and Council Bluff s (Lincoln: University of Nebraska of Nebraska,” Great Plains Quarterly 29, no. 4 (2009): Press, 2007), 61. 287, 288, 290, 299. 2. Harrison Johnson, Johnson’s History of Nebraska 21. Richard White, Railroaded: Th e Transcontinen- (Omaha: Henry Gibson, 1880), 116. tals and the Making of Modern America (New York: 3. George Francis Train, My Life in Many States Norton, 2011), 19. and in Foreign Lands: Dictated in My Seventy- Fourth 22. Stanley P. Hirshson, Grenville M. Dodge: Year (New York: Appleton, 1902), 290. Soldier, Politician, Railroad Pioneer (Bloomington: 4. Larsen et al., Upstream Metropolis, 60. Indiana University Press, 1967), 162. 5. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 164. 23. Grenville M. Dodge, Personal Recollections of 6. Telegram, George Francis Train to Th omas C. President Abraham Lincoln, General Ulysses S. Grant Durant, Leonard Levi Collection, University of Iowa and General William T. Sherman (Council Bluff s ia: Archives, Iowa City. Hereaft er Levi Collection. Monarch Printing Co., 1914), 16. 7. “Th e Union Pacifi c Railway,” New York Times, 24. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 147. December 4, 1863. 25. Union Pacifi c Stock Certifi cate; Union Pacifi c 8. Telegrams, George Francis Train to Th omas C. Stockholders List; Checks; George Francis Train Durant, Levi Collection. to Th omas C. Durant; Wilhelmina Davis Train to 9. Telegram, George Francis Train to Th omas C. Th omas C. Durant, Th omas C. Durant to Wilhelmina Durant, Levi Collection. Davis Train; Wilhelmina Davis Train to Henry C. 10. Kurt Kinbacher and William G. Th omas III, Crane; Th omas C. Durant to Wilhelmina Davis “Shaping Nebraska: An Analysis of Railroad and Train; George Francis Train to Th omas C. Durant, Land Sales, 1870- 1880,” Great Plains Quarterly 28 Levi Collection. (Summer 2008), 192. 26. Telegrams, George Francis Train to Th omas C. 11. Shelton Stromquist, A Generation of Boomers: Durant; Th omas C. Durant to George Francis Train, Th e Pattern of Railroad Labor Confl ict in Nineteenth- Levi Collection. Century America (Urbana: University of Illinois 27. Maury Klein, Union Pacifi c: the Birth of a Press, 1987), 17. Railroad, 1862– 1893 (ny: Doubleday, 1987), 30. 12. Ray Allen Billington, “Th e Origin of the Land 28. Lewis H. Haney, A Congressional History of Speculator as a Frontier Type,” Agricultural History 19 Railways in the United States (Madison: University of (1945): 204– 12, 205. Wisconsin Press, 1910), 2:64. 13. John C. Hudson, “Towns of the Western Rail- 29. Stromquist, Generation of Boomers, 17. roads,” Great Plains Quarterly 2, no. 1 (1982), 41– 54, 30. White, Railroaded, 103, 105. 42. 31. White, Railroaded, 117; David T. Canon and 58 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014

Charles Stewart III, “Committee Hierarchy and 50. Train, My Life in Many States and in Foreign Assignments in the U.S. Congress: Testing Th eories Lands, 289. of Legislative Organization, 1789– 1946” (paper pre- 51. Train to McCormick, August 28, 1865, in Wil- sented at the Midwest Political Science Association liam T. Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick: Harvest, Meeting, Chicago, April 2002), 22– 23. 1856–1884 (New York: Appleton, 1935), 135. 32. Sig Mickelson, Th e Northern Pacifi c Railroad 52. Train to McCormick, September 29, 1865, in and the Selling of the West: A Nineteenth- Century Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 135. Public Relations Venture (Sioux Falls sd: Center for 53. Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 134, 139. Western Studies, 1993), 15. 54. Rowland Hazard, Th e Credit Mobilier of Amer- 33. Telegram, George Francis Train to Th omas C. ica, a Paper Read before the Rhode Island Historical Durant, Levi Collection. Society, Tuesday Evening, February 22, 1881 (Provi- 34. Telegram, George Francis Train to Th omas C. dence ri: Sidney S. Rider, 1881), 19– 20; “Injunction Durant, Levi Collection. against the Union Pacifi c Railroad,” New York Times, 35. Klein, Union Pacifi c, 33. June 7, 1867. 36. Memo; Check, Levi Collection. 55. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 168. 37. “Th e Statement copied from the Chicago Re- 56. Hazard, Credit Mobilier, 20; Luke Potter Po- publican into the Press of Th ursday,” Daily Cleveland land, Th e Alleged Credit Mobilier Bribery, Made to the (oh) Herald, November 27, 1866. House of Representatives, February 18, 1873 (Wash- 38. David Haward Bain, Empire Express: Building ington dc: Government Printing Offi ce, 1873), 87. the First Transcontinental Railroad (New York: Viking Hereaft er cited as Poland Report; White, Railroaded, Penguin, 1999), 169. 33– 34. 39. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 165; Sakolski, Great 57. Robert G. Angevine, Th e Railroad and the American Land Bubble, 288. State: War, Politics, and Technology in Nineteenth- 40. Train, My Life in Many States and in For- Century America (Stanford ca: Stanford University eign Lands, 281– 82; Jay Boyd Crawford, Th e Credit Press, 2004), 186. Mobilier of America: Its Origin and History: Its Work 58. Quiett, Th ey Built the West, 157. of Constructing the Union Pacifi c Railroad and the 59. Crawford, Credit Mobilier of America, 9. Relation of Members of Congress Th erewith (Boston: 60. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 168; Sakolski, Great C. W. Calkins, 1880), 14. American Land Bubble, 288– 89. 41. Train, My Life in Many States and in Foreign 61. Hazard, Credit Mobilier, 17. Lands, 281- 82. 62. Hazard, Credit Mobilier, 21. 42. Jeremiah Wilson, Report of the Select Commit- 63. White, Railroaded, 35. tee of the House of Representatives, appointed under 64. Robert Edgar Riegal, Th e Story of Western the resolution of January 6, 1873: to make inquiry in Railroads: From 1852 through the Reign of the Giants relation to the aff airs of the Union Pacifi c Railroad (New York: Macmillan, 1926), 80. Company, the Credit Mobilier of America, and other 65. David Montgomery, Beyond Equality: Labor matters specifi ed in said resolution and in other and the Radical Republicans, 1862– 1872 (Champaign: resolutions referred to said Committee (Washington University of Illinois Press, 1961), 20. dc: Government Printing Offi ce, 1873), 159, 147, 140. 66. White, Railroaded, 65. Hereaft er cited as Wilson Report. 67. Edward C. Kirkland, Industry Comes of Age: 43. Wilson Report, 159. Business, Labor, and Public Policy, 1860– 1897 (Holt, 44. Train, My Life in Many States and in Foreign Rinehart and Winston, 1961), 53. Lands, 283. 68. Kirkland, Industry Comes of Age, 54, 73. 45. Wilson Report, 19. 69. Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 140– 41. 46. Bain, Empire Express, 132. 70. Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 144, 145, 47. Wilson Report, 431, 153. 147. 48. Train, My Life in Many States and in Foreign 71. Hirshson, Grenville M. Dodge, 191– 93. Lands, 287, 288. 72. Sakolski, Great American Land Bubble, 290. 49. Wilson Report, 159. 73. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- A Madman and a Visionary 59 cluded,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 19, 102. “Th e Union Pacifi c Railroad,” New York 1866; “George Francis Train on the Railroad Contin- Times, June 11, 1867. ued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, 103. “Union Pacifi c Railroad,” Savannah (ga) 1866. Daily News and Herald, October 22, 1867. 74. Stromquist, Generation of Boomers, 151. 104. Werts, “Platte County.” 75. Credit Foncier booklet, Levi Collection. 105. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 254. 76. Larsen et al., Upstream Metropolis, 56. 106. Sakolski, Great American Land Bubble, 292. 77. Montgomery, Beyond Equality, 18. 107. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 254; Quiett, Th ey 78. Sakolski, Great American Land Bubble, 290– 91. Built the West, 84. 79. Montgomery, Beyond Equality, 20. 108. Reps, Making of Urban America, 402. 80. Reps, Making of Urban America, 402. 109. Sakolski, Great American Land Bubble, 292– 93. 81. Walter Prescott Webb, Th e Great Plains (Bos- 110. Mickelson, Northern Pacifi c Railroad, 3, 15. ton: Ginn, 1931), 279. 111. Kinbacher and Th omas, “Shaping Nebraska,” 82. Hudson, Plains Country Towns, 13, 39. 196– 97. 83. Train to McCormick, September 29, 1865, in 112. Bain, Empire Express, 241, 252; “Th e Union Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 135. Pacifi c Railroad,” New York Times, June 11, 1867; 84. Bemis to McCormick, February 1, 1866, in Mickelson, Northern Pacifi c Railroad, 16; Riegal, Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 136. Story of Western Railroads, 202. 85. Hutchinson, Cyrus Hall McCormick, 136. 113. “Th e Senatorial Excursionists at Omaha,” 86. Larsen et al., Upstream Metropolis, 62; Quiett, New York Times, June 8, 1867; “Violent Hail Storm on Th ey Built the West, 162. the Plains— Hoax— Th e Senatorial Party,” New York 87. “George Francis Train Has Made Another Times, June 8, 1867. Large Land Purchase in Nebraska,” Milwaukee Daily 114. Webb, Great Plains, 454. Sentinel, October 5, 1866. 115. “Th e Union Pacifi c Railroad,” New York Times, 88. Check, Levi Collection. June 11, 1867; George Bird Grinnell, Two Great Scouts 89. John T. Bell, Omaha and Omaha Men, Remi- and Th eir Pawnee Battalion: Th e Experiences of Frank niscences (n.p., 1917), 27. J. North and Luther H. North, Pioneers in the Great 90. Larsen et al., Upstream Metropolis, 65; Charles West, 1856– 1882, and Th eir Defense of the Building of Collins’ Omaha City Directory (n.p., June 1866), 177. the Union Pacifi c Railroad (Cleveland oh: Arthur H. 91. Albert D. Richardson, Beyond the Mississippi: Clark Co., 1928), 148. From the Great River to the Great Ocean (Hartford 116. Grinnell, Two Great Scouts, 149. ct: American Publishing, 1867), 564, 565. 117. Grinnell, Two Great Scouts, 150; Bain, Empire 92. Silas Seymour, Incidents of a Trip (New York: Express, 409. D. Van Nostrand, 1867), 55. 118. “Th e Union Pacifi c Railroad,” New York 93. H. M. Stanley, My Early Travels and Adven- Times, June 11, 1867. tures in America and Asia (New York: C. Scribner, 119. “Union Pacifi c Railroad,” Savannah (ga) 1895), 210. Daily News and Herald, October 22, 1867. 94. Stanley, My Early Travels, 211. 120. Howard, Great Iron Trail, 212; Irene O’Brien, 95. Quiett, Th ey Built the West, 157– 58. “History of Columbus,” http://www.columbusne.us 96. Excursion Scrapbook, Levi Collection. /index.aspx?nid=323 (accessed September 6, 2013). 97. Charles Collins’ Omaha City Directory (Oma- 121. “George Francis Train on the Railroad,” Salt ha: Daily Herald Book and Job Offi ce, 1868), i. Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 14, 1866. 98. Richardson, Beyond the Mississippi, 566. 122. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 99. Linda Werts, “Platte County,” Andreas’ History tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 16, of the State of Nebraska, http://www.kancoll.org 1866. /books/andreas_ne/platte/platte-p2.html#organize 123. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- (accessed September 6, 2013). tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, 100. Richardson, Beyond the Mississippi, 566. 1866. 101. Seymour, Incidents of a Trip, 88. 124. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 60 Great Plains Quarterly, Winter 2014 cluded,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 19, 147. “Train’s Sanity— What His Old Friends Th ink 1866. of Him,” New York Times, May 1, 1873. 125. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 148. “Train Pronounced Sane,” New York Times, tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 16, May 7, 1873. 1866. 149. “George Francis Train,” New York Times, May 126. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 13, 1873; “Arraignments in the Court of Oyer and tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, Terminer,” New York Times, May 17, 1873. 1866. 150. “Th e Trial of George Francis Train,” New York 127. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- Times, May 20, 1873. tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, 151. “Train Stopped,” New York Times, May 21, 1873. 1866. 152. “Train Stopped,” New York Times, May 21, 1873. 128. Seymour, Incidents of a Trip, 86– 87. 153. “George Francis Train— His Petition to the 129. Telegram, Baylor to Th omas C. Durant, Levi Court,” New York Times, May 25, 1873. Collection; Hirshson, Grenville M. Dodge, 141. 154. “Train’s Sanity— A Jury Again Pronounces 130. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- Him Sane,” New York Times, May 30, 1873. tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, 155. “Th e News,” Clarksville (tx) Standard, June 7, 1866; Seymour, Incidents of a Trip, 103. 1873. 131. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 156. “New- York and Suburban News,” New York tinued,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 18, Times, June 1, 1873. 1866. 157. “Large Damages Claimed Against the Pacifi c 132. Seymour, Incidents of a Trip, 94. Railway Companies,” New York Times, November 13, 133. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 1869. cluded,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 19, 158. New York Daily Graphic: An Illustrated Eve- 1866. ning Newspaper, August 16, 1873. 134. Edwin Sabin, Building the Pacifi c Railway 159. “When George Francis Train Was a Candi- (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1919), 285. date,” Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, June 13, 1874. 135. “George Francis Train on the Railroad Con- 160. “George Francis Train’s Omaha Investments,” cluded,” Salt Lake (ut) Daily Telegraph, December 19, St. Louis Globe- Democrat, August 18, 1875. 1866. 161. “Omaha Oddities,” St. Louis Globe- Democrat, 136. “George Francis Train’s Omaha Investments,” March 8, 1876. St. Louis Globe- Democrat, August 18, 1875. 162. “George Francis Train’s Assets,” New York 137. Larsen et al., Upstream Metropolis, 62. Times, March 24, 1876. 138. Richardson, Beyond the Mississippi, 565. 163. “George Francis Train’s Assets,” New York 139. “G. F. Train in Prison,” New York Times, De- Times, March 24, 1876; “George Francis Train’s As- cember 21, 1872. sets,” St. Louis Globe- Democrat, March 26, 1876. 140. “George Francis Train Touches Bottom,” San 164. J. Spencer Fluhman, A Peculiar People: Anti- Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin, December 30, 1872. Mormons and the Making of Religion in Nineteenth- 141. “Domestic Intelligence,” Galveston Tri- Weekly Century America (Chapel Hill: University of North News, January 22, 1873. Carolina Press, 2012), 50. 142. “George Francis Train,” New York Times, 165. “George Francis Train’s Assets,” St. Louis March 28, 1873. Globe-Democrat , March 26, 1876; “General and Per- 143. “George Francis Train,” New York Times, sonal,” St. Louis Globe- Democrat, April 12, 1876. April 9, 1873. 166. “Th e Union Pacifi c Railroad,” St. Louis Globe- 144. “Is Train Insane?” New York Times, April 16, Democrat, April 4, 1876. 1873. 167. “Seeking a Slice of Omaha,” New York Times, 145. “Th e Train Lunacy Case,” New York Times, May 7, 1887. April 29, 1873. 168. “George Francis Train Pushing His Claim 146. “Th e Train Lunacy Investigation,” New York Against Omaha,” New Orleans Daily Picayune, May Times, April 24, 1873. 18, 1897. A Madman and a Visionary 61

169. “Geo. F. Train’s Busy Night,” New York Times, 174. “Good Short Stories[:] George Francis Train February 14, 1898. Furious,” Denver Evening Post, September 6, 1897. 170. Sakolski, Great American Land Bubble, 292. 175. “Psycho Proved Incapable,” Chicago Daily 171. “George Francis Train[:] Some of His Omaha Inter Ocean, September 4, 1893. Real Estate Speculations,” St. Louis Globe- Democrat, 176. Undated Omaha Herald clipping, Schools October 21, 1881. subject fi le, Douglas County Historical Society, 172. “George Francis Train Has Shied a Legal Omaha ne. Bombshell,” New Orleans Daily Picayune, June 4, 1887. 177. Train, My Life in Many States and in Foreign 173. “Psycho Proved Incapable,” Chicago Daily Lands, xvi, 293– 94, xvi, xvii. Inter Ocean, September 4, 1893. 178. White, Railroaded, 19.