Review: Blood on the Tracks
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 11 28, 2011
Cecelia Holland's "Blood on the Tracks" is a well-researched and well-written historical narrative about the 1877 uprising of railroad workers on the East Coast of the U.S.  It began small but spread to bigger cities when the railroad wanted to cut workers' wages by 10% which would mean an already struggling group of people would have it even worse.  The Pennsylvania RR decided to run their trains with two engines in tandem thereby pulling more cars but needing fewer crew members, and that meant layoffs.Railroad workers began to strike and state militias were called up.  By 1877 most state militias had served their purpose and were fairly ineffective in controlling large crowds of rowdy people.  This is a very interesting story that isn't often told, but had an impact on the railroads on the East coast.  At the time this took place, only twelve years after the end of the Civil War in 1865, a small group of people held a good portion of the wealth, wages were low, millions were unemployed, and some banks had failed.This is an excellent Kindle Single to read since this event isn't found in most of the history books today. I'm familiar with several of the places mentioned, and I've seen what the decline of the railroad, even today, has done to places like Cumberland, MD.  This is well worth reading for the knowledge and also for a comparison of what was going on at the end of the nineteenth century vs what is happening today.