In the early 1800's, moving goods across the United States was much harder than today. Railroads didn't really exist, waterways were limited, and roads were barely considered roads by today's standards.
America was politically united, but economically fragmented. The Internal Improvements movement in the post-Civil War period would help change that, connecting markets and turning a collection of loosely connected regions into a more integrated national economy.
This is an excerpt from episode 401 from our series, Internal Improvements,' looking at the pre- and post-Civil War period in the United States. This era saw an explosion in domestic transportation investment, which we get into in depth in our full episodes.
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