Blog #11: Final Draft of Civil War Essay

It was June 29th, 2007. Many had been lined up, days before the release, waiting to receive their own iPhone. After it was announced by Apple months before, anticipation had grown. Some Apple fans had already ordered their iPhone online, awaiting UPS to knock on their door or hopping on the subway destined to the nearest package delivery building. America had become technologically and mechanically wealthy, with all the development of phones for communication, transit systems for transportation, and more. We sometimes question where this outburst of new technology sprung from, but the origins of modern America could be dated back to the Civil War. During this time, these ideas and discoveries formed the basics of modern America, including our weaponry, methods of transportation, and communication.

Lets say you want to catch the subway to your job. You were running a little late and strived to make it safety inside before the door closes. It would always be there for our convenience. But it wasn't always there. It was developed from a form of transportation that had played a major role in the Civil War, trains. Before the war, trains were relatively new and had never been put to the test. When the war arose, trains became a key player in transportation. The military moved supplies and food to areas in need and supporting troops in territories of conquer. Soon enough, more then two hundred railroads came into existence at the start of the war. It was later used to transport cash crops and other supplies from state to state. Today, the use and mechanical aspects of trains have inspired modern day travel such as bullet trains, subways, and trolleys.

Every war has basic essentials, the use of firearms. In the course of the Civil War, rifles were created, firearms that fire 8 times more shots then muskets that were previously used in the American Revolution. The Civil War introduced the first magazine equipped weapon known as the Volcanic Rifle. As widely as the rifle was used back then, it is still used less severely for hunting. When reverting back to modern times, we have created a variety of firearms ranging from assault rifles, for overwhelming attacks, to sniper rifles, operated to achieve immense precision and a one-hit kills. You would probably not have your Scoped Mosin-Nagant sniper rifle and Thompson fully automatic gun option in "Call of Duty 2" if it hadn't been for weapon discoveries in the Civil War.

Imagine having to wait days to deliver a message that you don't even know was actually delivered. Before the Civil Wars, pony express messenger service was probably the best communication you had over distance. The invention of the telegram was just in time to aid the Civil War. It was the most convenient method of communication and was soon used to quickly report important battle information. Of course, it had its flaws of intercepted messages being changed and giving misinformation, but this issue was sorted out in the development processes that brings us to out modern telephone. Telegrams dawned the era of telephones. Even now, telephones almost look as old as telegrams. Taking the concept and idea of telephones, we have accomplished making even more high tech inventions such as cell phones.

Instead of simply evolving, ideas collected from the Civil War grew on its own and became the trunk of many modern ideas. The use of new technology played a huge factor on the outcome of the war and is still influencing our everyday society. A lot of the modern technology can be traced back to the Civil War, many more aspects excluding the ones I've already mentioned. It gave us weapons that were used in following wars like the usage of the Gatling Gun in the Spanish-American War and gave us insight on some of the important aspects of medicine such as the relationships between cleanliness, diet, and disease. Not only that, it contributed to battles after the war with ideas on artillery, understanding the health of the growing population - assisted both the public and the military -, and naval attack and defense with the usage of armor plated ships and torpedoes.