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A Ride on the Trans-Siberian Railroad in 1899
A Ride on the Trans-Siberian Railroad in 1899
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Nook version of vintage magazine article originally published in 1899. Contains lots of great info and pictures seldom seen in the last 120 years.
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Somehow I had formed the idea that Siberia was, in the main, a mountainous, broken, barren, and even sterile country, covered with forests—which opinion, I am inclined to think, is somewhat generally entertained in the west. Nothing could be farther from the fact. Of all the surprises met within my somewhat extensive travels, Siberia is the greatest. As a whole, it contains, perhaps, the largest continuous area of level lands on the globe. Excepting spurs of the great Altai range of mountains fringing its southern border, and cutting occasionally to some distance northward into Siberia, the entire western half of the country is exceptionally level, almost to flatness. Near Lake Baikal, in the foothills of the Altais, the mountains rise to a height of not over 6,000 feet, and it is only when going 100 miles further, to the very China border, that anything like a great altitude is reached.
The railway, therefore, having no great mountain ranges to cross, and throughout almost its entire length being built through a practically level country, pre¬sents no example of more than ordinary engineering achievement; in fact, it will be no more difficult to construct it clear through to the Pacific Ocean than it was to build the Union Pacific from Omaha to Salt Lake City. If a great section of country of, the United States and British America be taken, extending from the Gulf of Mexico through thirty degrees of latitude northward, and 2,000 miles east¬ward from the Rocky Mountains, it would fairly represent an area of country similar in physical characteristics to that portion of Siberia which we are considering. Indeed, the resemblance is not in extent only, for in their geological formation they are quite identical—the one being formed by the wash in primeval times from the eastern escarpment of the Rocky Mountains, and the other from the northern face of the great Central Asian Mountains in the south and that of the Urals in the west. The alluvial character of the soil in both places goes far to bear out this identity of origin. It would not be far from the fact to say that for 2,000 miles east of the Ural Mountains, and extending to the Arctic Sea, Siberia is almost as level as the ocean. In over 1,000 miles I do not believe the grade of the railroad varied 300 feet, and in many places it is as straight as an arrow without the slightest curve for forty or fifty miles. Indeed, there is one stretch of perfectly straight road for 116 versts, or nearly eighty miles.
Along the whole line there is the most luxurious growth of grass I have seen in any country. There are many varieties, some like the native blue stem of the west, and one variety that in appearance seemed closely allied to the Kentucky blue grass. Judging from the superb condition of the animals that graze upon them, they must all be of the most nutritious nature; it is, therefore, not only one of the finest, but by far the largest grazing region in existence. If fully utilized, I believe Siberia could furnish the beef supply for the world. The soil seems similar to that of Eastern Nebraska and Kansas; in fact, it is, in great part, identical with the Tchernozium formation in European Russia, an eastward extension of which it seems to be.
Read excerpt -
Somehow I had formed the idea that Siberia was, in the main, a mountainous, broken, barren, and even sterile country, covered with forests—which opinion, I am inclined to think, is somewhat generally entertained in the west. Nothing could be farther from the fact. Of all the surprises met within my somewhat extensive travels, Siberia is the greatest. As a whole, it contains, perhaps, the largest continuous area of level lands on the globe. Excepting spurs of the great Altai range of mountains fringing its southern border, and cutting occasionally to some distance northward into Siberia, the entire western half of the country is exceptionally level, almost to flatness. Near Lake Baikal, in the foothills of the Altais, the mountains rise to a height of not over 6,000 feet, and it is only when going 100 miles further, to the very China border, that anything like a great altitude is reached.
The railway, therefore, having no great mountain ranges to cross, and throughout almost its entire length being built through a practically level country, pre¬sents no example of more than ordinary engineering achievement; in fact, it will be no more difficult to construct it clear through to the Pacific Ocean than it was to build the Union Pacific from Omaha to Salt Lake City. If a great section of country of, the United States and British America be taken, extending from the Gulf of Mexico through thirty degrees of latitude northward, and 2,000 miles east¬ward from the Rocky Mountains, it would fairly represent an area of country similar in physical characteristics to that portion of Siberia which we are considering. Indeed, the resemblance is not in extent only, for in their geological formation they are quite identical—the one being formed by the wash in primeval times from the eastern escarpment of the Rocky Mountains, and the other from the northern face of the great Central Asian Mountains in the south and that of the Urals in the west. The alluvial character of the soil in both places goes far to bear out this identity of origin. It would not be far from the fact to say that for 2,000 miles east of the Ural Mountains, and extending to the Arctic Sea, Siberia is almost as level as the ocean. In over 1,000 miles I do not believe the grade of the railroad varied 300 feet, and in many places it is as straight as an arrow without the slightest curve for forty or fifty miles. Indeed, there is one stretch of perfectly straight road for 116 versts, or nearly eighty miles.
Along the whole line there is the most luxurious growth of grass I have seen in any country. There are many varieties, some like the native blue stem of the west, and one variety that in appearance seemed closely allied to the Kentucky blue grass. Judging from the superb condition of the animals that graze upon them, they must all be of the most nutritious nature; it is, therefore, not only one of the finest, but by far the largest grazing region in existence. If fully utilized, I believe Siberia could furnish the beef supply for the world. The soil seems similar to that of Eastern Nebraska and Kansas; in fact, it is, in great part, identical with the Tchernozium formation in European Russia, an eastward extension of which it seems to be.
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