FAMST 101D Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Albany River, Electrical Telegraph, Gadsden Purchase
Document Summary
Connected fulton"s steamboat (first steamboat in us) on albany. Ex: a ton of flour in buffalo, ny was worth . Traveling overland to nyc took 3 weeks and cost . Using canal took 8 days and cost . Packet boats - for small shipments and traveling people. Before the erie canal, the biggest us seaports were philly, By 1850, ny became #1, bigger than boston, baltimore, and. The erie canal made nyc the financial capital of the us. It cost million to build ( = billion today) Before the erie canal, infrastructure financing came from rich individuals, there was no federal funding for public projects, and there was no bond market (banks too small) Ec model: state-backed bonds; pooling small investors; bonds traded and sold in nyc; became the leading bond market; ec bonds payed off by tolls. You invest in this bond and it becomes small)
