p2
Railroads and the Making of Modern America: A Digital History Approach
William G. Thomas (University of Nebraska)
Abstract:
This digital history project collects railroad sources in texts, maps, and images into a central repository where computational techniques allow for interrelation, analysis, and visualization. The project focuses on the key topics in the development of railroads and modernity: land grants, immigration, workers, mobility, art and visual representation, environment, war, slavery, and segregation. The project has developed Historical Geographic Information Systems shapefiles for the growth of the American railroad network and with a National Endowment for the Humanities Digging into Data grant created a data framework for spatio-temporal representation of railroad growth. Project partners include the University of Nebraska, the University of Portsmouth, and Stanford University. We will demonstrate the range of this research and the guiding questions and problems behind the research.