THE second major field of Gould's corporate activity in the
three boom years of 1879, 1880, and 1881 was the rich traffic-
producing area between the Missouri River from Kansas City to
Omaha and the Great Lakes at Chicago, Toledo and Detroit.
This region was featured by the hottest kind of railroad competi-
tion. Through lines, branches, lines running counter to the main
direction of traffic, and roads partly finished abounded. Most of
the feeders and branches had passed their dividends, and a sub-
stantial majority had defaulted on their interest. Some of these
were of no strategic importance; others, although in or bordering
on receivership, controlled valuable terminal facilities or short
connections between rapidly growing traffic centers. It was there-
fore difficult for a few groups to acquire control and thereafter
maintain a competitive equilibrium. There were too many roads
and too many conflicting groups; but it was possible for one per-
son or group to acquire a few strategic lines and use them to dis-
turb the rate structure, to break the pools, and to produce busi-
ness chaos. This is what Gould accomplished in this region.

Gould's capture of a number of main lines dominating the
Kansas City-St. Louis area, and of the strategically located Wa-
bash extending from St. Louis and the upper Mississippi River
gateways to the Great Lakes at Toledo was both surprising and
spectacular. No one suspected his invasion of this region, and his
arrival led to fantastic estimates of future possibilities. Control
of the Wabash led him into territory crossed by eastern trunk
lines, and their connections enabled him to invade some of the
richest traffic areas of the country, as well as to challenge some
of the major trunk lines in their own territory. The upper and
lower Missouri valleys together with the lower Great Lakes area --
all directly invaded -- had transportation problems of their own,
and it is to these problems that attention must be directed. Only

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