Awards

• Commended for Spur Awards (Historical) 2006

Overview

The only major U.S. railroad to be operated by westerners and the only railroad built from west to east, the Southern Pacific acquired a unique history and character. It also acquired a reputation, especially in California, as a railroad that people loved to hate. This magisterial history tells the full story of the Southern Pacific for the first time, shattering myths about the company that have prevailed to this day. A landmark account, Sunset Limited explores the railroad's development and influence - especially as it affected land settlement, agriculture, water policy, and the environment - and offers a new perspective on the tremendous, often surprising, role the company played in shaping the American West. Meticulously researched, lucidly written, and judiciously balanced, Sunset Limited opens a new window onto the American West in a crucial phase of its development and will forever change our perceptions of one of the largest and most important western corporations in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Full Product Details

9780520200197

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Reviews

This deep and extensive examination of the Southern Pacific's development activities in California will encourage readers to look beyond the overblown rhetoric of the railroad's many political enemies and see afresh its many positive economic accomplishments as it worked to build the Twentieth-Century West. Orsi's presentation is as luminous as it is impressive - Carlos Schwantes, author of Going Places: Transportation Redefines the Twentieth Century West This brilliantly researched and beautifully written study of one of America's greatest railroads offers wonderful insights into both transportation and Western history. - H. Roger Grant, author of Follow the Flag: A History of the Wabash Railroad Company

Author Information

Richard Orsi is Professor Emeritus of History at California State University, Hayward, coauthor of The Elusive Eden: A New History of California (third edition, 2002), and editor of the California History Sesquicentennial Series.

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