Transportation & Technology Series

Railroad Heritage: Entrepreneurship, Technology and Social Impacts

New York's Capital Region: A National Leader in Railroading
The importance of railroading to the Albany area is viewed from an historical perspective as F. Daniel Larkin discusses our city's prominence in the national scheme.

F. Daniel Larkin (PhD in U.S. History) is Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at SUNY Oneonta, and also holds the academic rank of SUNY Distinguished Service Professor. Dr. Larkin's has written books on New York's history, railroads and canals, and is currently completing a biography of Benjamin Wright, chief engineer of the original Erie Canal and "Father of American Civil Engineering." Larkin, a native of Rome, NY, now resides in Oneonta, NY

Railroads and Social Conflict in Albany
In this talk, David Stowell will look at the injurious impact of the railroads on everyday life in Albany in the 1870s. He will also examine the opposition which developed and was spearheaded by small business owners, culminating in the Great Strike of 1877.

David O. Stowell is an associate professor of history at Keene State College in Keene, NH. He received his Ph.D. in U.S. history from SUNY-Buffalo in 1992, and is the author of Streets, Railroads, and the Great Strike of 1877 (University of Chicago Press, 1999). He lives with his wife in Amherst, Massachusetts