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A Mighty Fine Road: A History of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad Company Kindle Edition

by H. Roger Grant (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 69 ratings
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“Grant has once again hit a home run . . . a detailed but readable history of the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific, a major Midwestern railroad.” —Carlos A. Schwantes, St. Louis Mercantile Library Professor Emeritus

The Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad’s history is one of big booms and bigger busts. When it became the first railroad to reach and then cross the Mississippi River in 1856, it emerged as a leading American railroad company. But after aggressive expansion and a subsequent change in management, the company struggled and eventually declared bankruptcy in 1915. What followed was a cycle of resurrections and bankruptcies; a grueling, ten-year, ultimately unsuccessful battle to merge with the Union Pacific; and the Rock Island’s final liquidation in 1981. But today, long after its glory days and eventual demise, the “Mighty Fine Road” has left behind a living legacy of major and feeder lines throughout the country. In his latest work, railroad historian H. Roger Grant offers an accessible, gorgeously illustrated, and comprehensive history of this iconic American railroad.

“This handsome, well-illustrated book merits the attention of any reader interested in the history of Iowa. And just as important, the book reminds us of the importance of railroads to the history and vitality of American society. All aboard!” —Iowa City Press-Citizen

“A Mighty Fine Road lays out the amazing, yet heartbreaking history of the railroad I loved. The historical opportunities and disappointments of the Rock Island is clearly explained in Grant’s book, with visionaries keeping the dream moving forward, yet damaged and constrained by greed and lack of vision with the next management regime.” —Dan Sabin, President, Iowa Northern Railway Company
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  1. Print length
    342 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  4. Publisher
    Indiana University Press
  5. Publication date
    October 6, 2020
  6. Reading age
    18 years and up
  7. File size
    44107 KB
  8. Page Flip
    Enabled
  9. Word Wise
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  10. Enhanced typesetting
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Roger Grant has once again hit a home run with his latest book, a detailed but readable history of the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific, a major Midwestern railroad. Grant's narrative spans the Rock Island's many significant accomplishments as well as its several sad chapters, including a final one that included bankruptcy and liquidation. It was a time, as Grant vividly phrases it, when "off came the wheels." Well-chosen maps and photographs add to the value of a "mighty fine" book."―Carlos A. Schwantes, St. Louis Mercantile Library Professor Emeritus

"H. Roger Grant's A Mighty Fine Road presents a masterfully researched and written history of one of the nation's most important railroads. From its earliest days crossing Illinois, then the Mississippi River, to its ultimate demise in the 1980s, Grant fills a significant void by producing this authoritative history."―Thomas G. Hoback, Founder, President and CEO, Indiana Rail Road (Retired)

"From its storied birth to its sordid death, H. Roger Grant provides a complete history of the Rock Island, one of America's most famous – and infamous – railroads."―Albert Churella, Kennesaw State University, author of The Pennsylvania Railroad, Volume I: Building an Empire, 1846-1917.

"A Mighty Fine Road lays out the amazing, yet heartbreaking history of the railroad I loved. The historical opportunities and disappointments of the Rock Island is clearly explained in Grant's book, with visionaries keeping the dream moving forward, yet damaged and constrained by greed and lack of vision with the next management regime."―Dan Sabin, President, Iowa Northern Railway Company

"Grant's presentation is complete and unbiased with no favoritism shown toward government, management, or labor – each party contributing to its legacy of being the largest Class I railroad to be liquidated in American railroad history."―The Michigan Railfan

"H. Roger Grant's history of one of the nation's most significant Midwestern railroads is a mighty fine book."―David Pfeiffer, Railroad History

"This handsome, well-illustrated book merits the attention of any reader interested in the history of Iowa. And just as important, the book reminds us of the importance of railroads to the history and vitality of American society. All aboard!"―Timothy Walch, IOWA CITY PRESS-CITIZEN

"This book would make a valuable addition to the libraries of railroad enthusiasts, especially those whose interests is in midwestern railroads, as well as professional historians. The notes at the end, on their own, are an invaluable resource that any historian writing on American railroads could spend many days or weeks scouring for sources."―Sean Kammer, Kansas History

Review

A Mighty Fine Road lays out the amazing, yet heartbreaking history of the railroad I loved. The historical opportunities and disappointments of the Rock Island is clearly explained in Grant's book, with visionaries keeping the dream moving forward, yet damaged and constrained by greed and lack of vision with the next management regime.

-- Dan Sabin, President, Iowa Northern Railway Company

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08DLRST1D
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Indiana University Press; Illustrated edition (October 6, 2020)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 6, 2020
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 44107 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 342 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 69 ratings

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Customer reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
4.7 out of 5
69 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Penny
5.0 out of 5 stars Great story about the Rick Island Railroad.
Reviewed in the United States on September 10, 2022
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I worked for the Rick Island Railroad until it closed. Love this book.
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D. G.
5.0 out of 5 stars Very informative
Reviewed in the United States on August 15, 2021
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A very interesting and easy read filled with solid information as well as colorful anecdotes. Interesting photos and maps. Good book
One person found this helpful
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Tundra B
4.0 out of 5 stars Mirrors the rise and fall and rise of the industry
Reviewed in the United States on December 31, 2023
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From a classy, well build road, to the regulatory constraints, to the consolidation and fallout; this book tells the story of the American railroading industry through one road’s history. I highly recommend having an atlas handy to follow the formation of the road to its peak. The book could used a few more maps in that regard.
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John Crist
5.0 out of 5 stars A Mighty Fine History
Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2021
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I am really enjoying this book; it is well written and thorough.
John the train buff
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David Mack
5.0 out of 5 stars A Mighty Fine Read
Reviewed in the United States on December 16, 2020
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A mighty fine read about my favorite railroad. TONS of history and background of the business decisions that built (and eventually doomed) "The Rock".
One person found this helpful
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Thomas A. Leverenz
5.0 out of 5 stars Good update to my collection.
Reviewed in the United States on February 4, 2021
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Great addition to my collection
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Henry Posner III
5.0 out of 5 stars A book worthy of the subject
Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2021
As Chairman of the railroad that claims the title “The Rock Island Line” (Iowa Interstate, which inherited the bulk of the original Rock Island main line from Chicago to Omaha), I am way overdue in submitting my review of this book. My excuse is that I wanted to write a proper review after noting the best parts, which I do by putting post- it notes on the most important pages. My copy now bristles with post- it notes, so rather than “double the hill” on other reviews I will make the following highly-selective comments.
1. It is comprehensive, detailed and with extensive notes
2. The notes themselves introduce additional resources, such as the existence of a two volume privately published history of Henry Crown, the railroad’s most high profile and controversial investor in its final years
3. The author’s scholarly style did not prohibit him from making his own colorful comments that put the Rock Island in its final years in context, such as “a transportation slum”; “a corner of the basement by itself”, etc.
4. Evidence of the author’s detailed research include referencing the cockroaches which were a feature of LaSalle street station in its final years. As they were albino cockroaches, having evolved per folklore in the darkness of the abandoned boiler house, this caused a flashback the biggest regret of my own brief employment there during the summer of 1976, which is that I did not save one for posterity.
I will close by agreeing with other reviewers that a shortcoming is a lack of maps, which forces the reader to flip between text and whatever map resources might be at hand: this is a suggestion for the next version of this excellent and comprehensive work
Henry Posner III
Chairman
Iowa Interstate Railroad
8 people found this helpful
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Robert Ray
4.0 out of 5 stars Solid history the Rock Island
Reviewed in the United States on October 15, 2020
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This is a good solid history of the Rock. The road died basically because too much of its traffic was agricultural, its lines between cities were frequently the longest, its use of trackage rights (instead of construction) to get into major cities deprived it of access to shippers, it paid too much in dividends instead of investments in the road, most of the line's routes had little traffic, and it suffered from several very poor managements (the notorious Reid-Moore Syndicate for one). The only previous history was William Hayes "Iron Road to Empire" in 1953. Hayes worked as a writer and finished as a publicist and his book is a popular history. i haven't looked at my copy for years but surprisingly Grant used it frequently as a source. There's no bibliography but Grant has an extensive list of notes and references. Grant was able to carry the road's history through its bankruptcy and liquidation. The book is well edited with few mistakes. I'm surprised Grant didn't mention the Dust Bowl's effects on the road as its lines in Kansas and Oklahoma must have been heavily affected, and his history of the road's shutdown is different than I remember (I believe LBJ embargoed the road at the request of the labor unions). There are lots of photos although surprisingly (maybe it's too common) there is no picture of the Samson of the Cimarron bridge. The book gets four stars because of its maps. They are almost all printed on only 1/3rd of a page and so are illegible and almost useless. This is particularly unfortunate with the 1932 traffic density map on p. 163. The two timetable maps are printed so badly that they remind me of Lucius Beebe's comment in a book review that the photos in that book looked like an Indian blanket had been used for a filter. Why the publisher did not just rotate the maps 90 degrees and print them on a full page is beyond me.
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Top reviews from other countries

Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Well written overview history of the Rock Island
Reviewed in Canada on October 25, 2020
Verified Purchase
As is usual, Prof. Grant writes a clear and what appears to be a well-balanced short history of the railroad. My only advice, though, is to have a GOOD atlas handy when reading it, as the maps are non-existent in the book yet there are a LOT of place names mentioned. There are reproductions of a few system maps in the illustrations but the print on them is so small that I literally had to get a magnifying glass to read it. But with a good atlas at hand, the book was a pleasure to read.
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DHAC
4.0 out of 5 stars A very welcome standard history of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 29, 2020
Verified Purchase
When publication of this book was announced, I was sufficiently excited to rush to pre-order and undoubtedly paid more than was wise, especially for a hard back that isn't properly bound and therefore will probably lose its pages like a cheap paper-back.
That aside, I enjoyed the book greatly. Mr Grant's style is a bit clunky and academic; but who cares, he churns out solidly researched, interesting histories and I, for one, am very grateful for that.
Apart from general railway history, my knowledge of the Rock Island was limited to Bill Marvel's disappointing "The Rock Island Line" and Gregory Schneider's excellent "Rock Island Requiem", of which only the first-named pretended to be a cradle to grave history, but did so in rather skimpy style. Grant's book therefore fills a significant void and does it well.
The book is a fairly substantial read, but comfortable within 280-odd pages of text and masses of references. It covers all line openings and the reasons for them, with brief potted histories of the Rock Island's predecessors and interesting portraits of historical events, taking the tale right up to the final bankruptcy and its legacy.
The history is quite 'corporate' in style with short biographies of the leading personalities (so typical of Grant) which help fashion an image of the qualities and experience each individual brought to the railroad. Being corporate, it also focuses on the complex issues of finance and regulation, and covers well the disastrous Moore interregnum which so damaged the capital base of the railroad that it never quite recovered from the over-capitalization they foisted on the company. The attention given to the contributions of various top dogs in the company is helpful, though I feel there is a little too much eulogizing over J D Farrington's contribution, given that he failed, as the author points out, to actually deal with the on-line industrial weaknesses that ultimately brought the line to ruin. I also think a little more attention might have been given to the work of Downing Jenks, who went from the presidency of the Rock Island to the unfancied Missouri Pacific and arguably turned it into the nation's finest road - one which, unlike the Rock Island, the Union Pacific really did want to buy. The book would also have benefited from a few tables of operational and financial performance over the longer period.
Other reviewers have raised the issue of poor maps, and I must agree with them, something the experienced railway-history publisher, Indiana University Press, should have spotted and remedied. Another minor textual complaint is the reference to states by colloquial names, which this UK-based reader found a little tedious.
Those readers with a fascination for the line's passenger services will probably like the attention given to them, as well as the illustrations (all black and white unfortunately), but the railroad was always going to live or die through its freight services and these are not half so well covered. However, I did appreciate Grant's avoidance the common obsession for endless discussion about locomotives - how refreshing, its absence gives the book a better balance than some other writers achieve.
But this is a general history of the line, it cannot satisfy all demands, and overall it is a fine work: I would not want my minor criticisms to detract too much from what will undoubtedly be seen as the standard work on the line. The Rock Island has many friends still and I expect the book to sell well and satisfy all but the most demanding of readers.
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Amazon Customer
1.0 out of 5 stars Really poor quality production
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 22, 2022
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I recently rode on the IAIS which is the former Rock Island and bought this book to understand more about the Rock Island. It is dull as ditchwater and very poorly reproduced - all images are black and white and grainy - how sad that the author made such an effort and the publisher let him down so badly.
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