"By concentrating on a small region, a short chronological scope, and a certain form of industrialization, namely the earliest railroads of southwest Virginia, [Noe] is able to illusttrate the slice such an innovation makes in the total cross-section of a society: its politics and culture as well as its economic outlook and achievement." -- American Historical Review "[Noe argues] that both slavery and secession sentiment were far more prevalent in the mountains of southwestern Virginia than usually thought. He contends that the railroad.tied the region to the state of Virginia and was a big factor in dertermining that the region would not become part of the new state of West Virginia." -- CHOICE.