til 1869, four years after the closing of the war, that any
radical change took place. But in the years that had intervened, a new
and commanding figure in the railroad world had come upon the scene.
This man had grown to be the dominating genius, not only in the field
of railway expansion, but in the world of finance as well. His name was
Cornelius Vanderbilt. Born in 1794 in very humble circumstances, he had
received little or no education, and as a youth had eked out a living by
ferrying passengers and garden produce from Staten Island to New York.
He had painfully saved a few hundred dollars within a year or two
after his marriage, and with this capital he began his career in the
transportation business. From his first ferrying project he engaged in
other undertakings and laid the foundation of his subsequent fortune in
steamboat navigation. About 1860, at an age when most men are beginning
to retire from active affairs, the "Commodore"--as he was called on
account of his numerous fleet--entered actively into the field of
railway development, management, and consolidation. The extraordinary
character and genius of the man are well depicted by the events of the
years that followed.

Before the opening of the Civil War and until immediately after its end,
the New York Central and the Erie systems were controlled by bitterly
antagonistic interests. These interests were beginning to foresee the
day when extremely aggressive competition would call into play their
greatest energies. Vanderbilt, wiser than his generation, foresaw more
than this. His vision took in the vast future values of the properties
as developed trunk lines, and the greater possibilities of their control
and operation as a consolidated whole. He was in a very real sense
the forerunner or pioneer of the great consolidation period of a half
century later. He was the Harriman and the Hill of his day.

The Erie had its own approach to New York City, but the New York
Central was connected with the metropolis only by the river and the two
independent roads--the Harlem Railroad and the Hudson River Railroad.
To get the latter two roads under his complete control was Vanderbilt's
first object. He would then have unimpeded access to New York and so
become independent of the river.

He began his ambitious plans by making himself the master of the Harlem
property, and in so doing got his first experience in railroad stock
manipulation and at the same time pick