The transcontinental railroads were built and owned by private companies but financed by the public (with one exception, James J. Hill's Great Northern). The sparseness of population between the Mississippi Valley and California and Oregon (Washington State after 1889) made it impossible to attract private investors to railroads connecting the East and West. Construction was too expensive
Building a mile of track meant bedding 3,000 ties in gravel and attaching 400 rails to them by driving 12,000 spikes. Having built that mile in Utah or Nevada, a railroader had nothing to look forward to but hundreds more miles of scarcely inhabited desert mountains. With no customers along the way, there would be no profits; without profits, no investors. The federal government had political and military interests in binding the Pacific Coast to the rest of the Union, and, in its land, the The Pacific Railway Act of 1862 granted to two companies, the Union Pacific (UP) and the Central Pacific (CP), a right of way 200 feet wide between Omaha, Nebraska, and Sacramento, California. For each mile of track that the companies built, they were to receive, on either side of the tracts, 10 alternate sections (square miles) of the public domain. The result was a belt of land 40 miles wide, laid out like a checkerboard on which the UP and the CP owned half the squares. The railroads sold the land to provide the money for construction and created customers in the buyers. Or they used their vast real estate as collateral against which to borrow cash from banks. In addition, depending on the terrain, the government lent the two companies between $16,000 and $48,000 per mile of track at bargain interest rates. "For each mile of track that the companies built, they were to receive...10 alternate sections of the public domain." "The result was a belt of land..."
a. example
b. illustration
c. cause and effect
d. statement and clarification
c
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Yo no ________________ (be able) viajar con ustedes.
Fill in the blank(s) with the appropriate word(s).
Ascolta quello che scrive Mark ai genitori e rispondi alle seguenti domande.
Mark, un ragazzo italoamericano, arriva in Italia e scrive un email ai genitori descrivendo i suoi primi giorni italiani. Cari mamma e papà, sto bene e mi piace la mia nuova famiglia italiana. La mamma si chiama Emma, fa la casalinga ed è una bravissima cuoca mentre il papà si chiama Goffredo ed è un avvocato. Ho anche una sorella della mia stessa età che si chiama Angela e frequenta l’università di economia e commercio qui a Siena. La vita è un po’ diversa da quella solita americana, ma mi sto abituando. Qui si mangia a ore diverse e devo dire che i pasti sono più abbondanti di quelli americani. Penso di essere già più grasso di prima, ma quando provo a rifiutare un piatto la mia mamma italiana sembra offendersi. Spero solo di non dover comprare dei pantaloni nuovi! Come reagisce la mamma italiana quando Mark prova a rifiutare un piatto cucinato da lei?____________________________________________________________________________________
The fireworks _____ me but _____ some children.
Select the letter of the consistent verbs for the blanks in the following sentences. A) delight, frightened B) delighted, frightens C) delighted, frightened
Lisez le passage suivant sur le statut des langues régionales en Europe.
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Première étape.
Choisissez la réponse qui complète le mieux chaque phrase, selon le texte.
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Deuxième étape.
Quelle est la langue majoritaire et la langue ou les langues minoritaire(s) de votre région? À votre avis, est-ce qu’il est important de reconnaître (officiellement) la diversité linguistique à l’école? Pourquoi ou pourquoi pas?
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