John Moody

People began to understand that with the acquisition of California the nation had obtained practically half a continent, of which the future possibilities were almost unlimited, so far as the development of natural resources and the genera production of wealth were concerned.

The public conviction that a railroad linking the West and the East was an absolute necessity became so pronounced after the gold discoveries of '49 that Congress passed an act in 1853 providing for a survey of several lines from the Mississippi to the Pacific.

My grandmother spent her whole life working as a maid, a cook and a babysitter, barely scraping by, but still working hard to give my mother, her only child, a chance in life, so that my mother could give my brother and me an even better one.