Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1850-1854, 1853-11-04
The Effect Of Railroads in the Western
States

States.
We extract from the New York Eyyfp;a1
Post the following statistical information,
which will be found to have at once interest
and Importance
The effects Of railroads in the western states
We're only beginning to show themselves in
1858. 1t will be necessary to vat for an
o;hcr census before they can be enumerated
fully or accurately.
One of these effects is to introduce into the
western country great body of consumers,
in the laborers employed i'll constructing the
roads, and their families As to the number
OF these, we have been told bv the superintcn-
dent OF a prominent western road, that TWEEN
ty-tive hborers per mile is a fair average
whose wives and children will amount t,
quarter as many more-in all, about thirty
people u mile. But this seems a large
average for the whole length of a line of rail
way. Let us halve the number, we have H.
teen persons supported 10y every mile of road.
10 make still further abatement, call the
number ten per mile, and We have engaged
on our railroads and supported by them, I20,,
900 people. To show that this calculation
is moderate one, the Fort WAYNE road, of
50 miles, between Fort Wayne and Chca-
20, employs 1000 laborers, exclusive of fam
lilies, and the Illinois Central, of 60 miles,
nearly 10000, exclusive of families
These iaIorers receive high wages, in each,
part OF viii ii is paid over to the farmers and
traders for food and clo.hinr, part goes for
the purchase of land, and part to Europe to
help over their countymen. Those at work
on the Fort Wayne road are paid from 100000
to $4,000 per month"; lii cash; those on the
Illinois Central, about $288,O0O. Wages
range from s y to s. so a day Before
the time of railroads, they run from 75 cents
to 81.
Saying that over 10000 laborers, (that
proportion OF the 10000 that are bona fde
aborers) receive 81 p per day each, thi,
would be over sll2,500, or yearly, allowing
800 working days to the year. $33,65O,O0O.
Suppose these 10000 people, the labor
ers anu their families. need, on an average,
81 week to feed and cIothe them, this would
amount to Sl2, 100000 a year. This detluc-
ted from the $33, 100000 earned by the Ia
boring portion, leaves $2l,OO0,OO0 of which
We may suppose them to lay up and remit to
Europe one third, or 100000. We shall
have, then, 526,00O,O0O As the sum expend-
el in the country annually 10y the laborers on
railroads for food, clothing, land and Iuxar-
les. This is exclusive of the keep and hire
of horses and cattle, which might be eStima-
ted at several millions more; Also of mechan-
les labor, timber, DC, furnished by the in-
habltants on the railroad Observation-Disclosures
aconsidcrabe Item.
The roads, it will be observed, have raised
the price of labor from 81 cents to 81 %, or
over 40 per cent
Looking at the western an northwestern
states, what Will be the effect of thus! The
population in 1856, of Ohio Indiana, Illinois,
Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota,
was over 100000. The ratio of increase in
all these states together, leaving out the first)
had been for the previous ten years, IS per
cent. We may safely say that it has been
25 per cent for the past three years. This
would make the present population of those
states 5,S75,000. Estimating the proportion
of males (thi> being a new region of -ountry)
at 60 per cent and of this 60 per cent, icon
slderlng the emigration to he largely of
grown per>ons) one-haIf as able bodied men,
we have 80 per cent, on 100000, men able
TO work. Suppose halfwork their own land,
or do not work at all, they still feel the in
creased value of produce, and get better paid
for their labor. Omitting this halt. however
we still have have Is percent, on 100000,
rs hired Eborers, or $4,000 men. Suppos-
ing these get 25 cents day more than before
for their work, tour estimate above made it
half more, 374 cents,) this would be $75
per annum, or, for the whole $4,000, 500
100000. Here are sixty five millions add
ed to the wages of labor in the states above
referred 20, emitting any consideration of the
increased receipts of working men not hired
No enterprise, not even the introduction of
the cotton manufacture into the New Eng
land States, has wrought such change in the
country, IN this respect, as railroads.
/ Michigan, IN 1880, had / 900 inhabitants;
in 1910, 2l2,o00; in 1850, 400. 900. Wis
consin in 1910, had $1,000: in 1850, $685.
000-an increase of 500 per cent, by far the
largest of any State in the Union. and direct
" traceable to the facilities for reaching her.
afforded her by the upper lake steamers. To-
wa, in 1910, had $4,000; in 1850, o. 600
Illinois, with no railroad facilities, with only
one considerable port on the lakes, aud with
her canal unfinished, and burthened with re
pudiated debt, accommodating over coming gen
erations, increased from $4,000, in 1880, to
! 100000, in 1910, and $4,000 in 1850.
With her new. outlets to the east by her canal
and by various railroads that have opened her
prairies to the husbandman, she must show