Research topic: James Jerome Hill

James Jerome Hill 1838-1916, American railroad builder, b. Ontario, Canada. He went to St. Paul, Minn., in 1856. He became a partner of Norman Kittson in a steamboat line and, with Kittson, Donald Alexander Smith (later Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal), and Sir George Stephen, he bought (1878) the St. Paul and Pacific RR. It was completed to the Canadian border, but Hill, having early envisioned the expansion of farming, trade, and industry from Minnesota to the Rockies and beyond, set about to carry the line westward in what was probably the greatest feat of railroad building in the United... Read more