The spike

Of all the things we saw today perhaps the least likely for a blog would be a Railroad Spike.  However as I stood at the bottom of the New River Gorge and saw a pile of old Railroad spikes I began to think about the incredible amount of effort required to lay the first railroad lines down that narrow valley.  The intercontinental of every thing we've seen so far is incredible.  One of the nicknames for the railroad was the iron horse, the increased use of rail required a tremendous amount of iron and steel.  This need increased the demand for coke to make the iron to drive the engines which need the coal for energy to hall the coke to make the iron to make the engines.... You get my point.  The fact of the matter is that little old WV played a huge role in the industrialization of the Untied States, and without this industrialization the U.S. wouldn't be what it is today.  This brings me to the spike.  These simple little device is crucial to the railroad.  It's inventions allowed for rails to be secured quickly and economically and are credited with the rapid increase in the construction of railroads in the 19th century.