VI.閱讀測驗: 12% Thework of the railroad pioneers in America became the basis for a greatsurge of railr

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VI.閱讀測驗: 12% Thework of the railroad pioneers in America became the basis for a greatsurge of railroad building halfway through the nineteenth centurythat linked the nation together as never before. Railroads eventuallybecame the nation’s number one transportation system, and remainedso until the construction of the interstate highway system halfwaythrough the twentieth century. They were of crucial importance instimulatingeconomic expansion, but their influence reached beyond the economyand was pervasive in American society at large. By1804, English as well as American inventors had experimented withsteam engines for moving land vehicles. In 1820,John Stevens ran a locomotive and cars around in a circular track onhis New Jersey estate, which the public saw as an amusing toy. And in1825, after opening a short length of track, the Stockton toDarlington Railroad in England became the first line to carry generaltraffic. American businesspeople, especially those in the Atlanticcoastal region who looked for better communication with the West,quickly became interested in the English experiment. The firstcompany in America to begin actual operations was the Baltimore andOhio, which opened a thirteen-mile length of track in 1830. It used ateam of horses to pull a train of passenger carriages and freightwagons along the track. Steam locomotive power didn’t come intoregular service until two years later. However,for the first decade or more, there was not yet a true railroadsystem. Even the longest of the lines was relatively short in the1830’s, and most of them served simply to connect water routes toeach other, not to link one railroad to another.Even when two lines did connect, the tracks often differed in width,so cars from one line couldn’t fit onto tracks of the next line.Schedules were unreliable and wrecks were frequent. Significantly,however, some important developments during the 1830’s and 1840’sincluded the introduction of heavier iron rails, more flexible andpowerful locomotives, and passenger cars were redesigned to becomemore stable, comfortable, and larger. By the end of 1830 only 23miles of track had been laid in the country. But by 1836,more than 1,000 miles of track had been laid in eleven States, andwithin the decade, almost 3,000 miles had been constructed. By thatearly age, the United States had already surpassed Great Britain inrailroad construction, and particularly from the mid-1860’s, thelate nineteenth century belonged to the railroads.
51. The word “stimulating” in line 6 is closest in meaning to
(A) helping
(B) changing
(C) promoting
(D) influencing

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答案：C
難度：適中0.5
統計：A(0),B(0),C(0),D(0),E(0)

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