biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1797–1872)
|
| biography:
| Merchant and railroad promoter, born in North Groton, Connecticut, USA. A dry-goods merchant, he became head of his own firm in 1836. After suffering financial losses and the death of his wife in 1840, he travelled to China, where he became very wealthy as an agent for several New York firms, and envisioned the value of an American transcontinental railroad to trade with China. He devised a plan for its construction, which he presented to Congress (1844), and spent the next seven years lobbying the public through newspapers, speeches, and pamphlets, including A Project for a Railroad to the Pacific (1849). In 1852 he remarried and retired to his Washington estate. He died shortly after the first transcontinental railroad was completed. |
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