Since I have an interest in that great American epic,the building of the transcontinental railroad, and in the parallels between current public policy debates and earlier railroad controversies, Google Books is wonderful. It provides access to many obscure sources that were formerly available only at major libraries, and difficult to find even then unless one knew exactly what one sought.
Who knew that the 1870 Report of the Commissioner of the U.S. Land Office contains crucial information on railroad construction costs, or that The Political Reformation, a pamphlet put out by the Democrats in 1884, contains cheerfully cynical insights into the venality of the U.S. Congress by Collis P. Huntington, one of the founders of the Central Pacific'?
One benefit of the improved access should be an improvement in knowledge of history. A great problem is that the story of an era gets written a time or two, and then everyone cribs from this work, until, perhaps, a new paradigm is written, and everyone cribs from that. Very few people have access to the sources, and thus the ability to challenge the narrative is limited. The digitization of great libraries is changing this, expanding access and opening up the process to all.
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