Editing Northern Pacific Railway (section)

===Jay Cooke takes control===
For the next six years, backers of the road struggled to find financing. Though [[John Gregory Smith]], succeeded Perham as second president on January 5, 1865, groundbreaking did not take place until February 15, 1870, at Carlton, Minnesota, {{convert|25|mi}} west of [[Duluth, Minnesota|Duluth]] (western port town on [[Lake Superior]] of the [[Great Lakes]]). The backing and promotions of famed [[New York City]] / [[Wall Street]] financier [[Jay Cooke]], in the summer of 1870 brought the first real momentum to the railway company.

Over the course of 1871, the Northern Pacific pushed westward from Minnesota into the [[Dakota Territory]] (present-day state of [[North Dakota]]). Surveyors and construction crews had to maneuver through swamps, bogs, and tamarack forests. The difficult terrain and insufficient funding delayed by six months the construction phase in Minnesota.<ref>{{cite journal | first=John M.| last=Lubetkin| title='Twenty-Six Feet and no Bottom': Constructing the Northern Pacific Railroad| journal=Minnesota History| date=2006| volume=60| issue=1| pages=4–17}}</ref> The N.P. also began building its line north from [[Kalama, Washington|Kalama, Washington Territory]], on the [[Columbia River]] just outside of [[Portland, Oregon]], towards the [[Puget Sound]]. Four small construction locomotive engines were purchased, the ''Minnetonka'', ''Itaska'', ''Ottertail'' and ''St. Cloud'', the first of which was shipped to Kalama by ship all around the continent of [[South America]] and the [[Cape Horn]] to the Pacific Ocean. In Minnesota, the [[Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad]] completed construction of its {{convert|155|mi|adj=on}} line stretching from [[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]] east to [[Lake Superior]] at Duluth in 1870. It was leased to the Northern Pacific line six years later in the [[Centennial Exposition|American Centennial celebration year]] of 1876 and was eventually absorbed by the Northern Pacific. The famed ''North Coast Limited'' was the Northern Pacific's flagship passenger train and the Northern Pacific itself was built along the trail first blazed by the famed [[Lewis and Clark]] expedition first exploring the new [[Louisiana Purchase]] and the further American West in 1804 and 1805.<ref>William R. Kuebler, ''The Vista Dome North Coast Limited: The Story of the Northern Pacific Railway's Famous Domeliner'' (2004).</ref>

The Northern Pacific reached [[Fargo, North Dakota|Fargo, Dakota Territory (now North Dakota)]] on the border between Dakota Territory and Minnesota early in June 1872. The following year, in June 1873, the N.P. reached the shores of the upper [[Missouri River]] at [[Bismarck, North Dakota|Edwinton, Dakota Territory (now the state capital of Bismarck, North Dakota)]]. In the west sector, the N.P. track extended {{convert|25|mi}} north from Kalama. Surveys were carried out in the Dakota Territory protected by 600 troops of the horse cavalry of the [[United States Army]], under command of Civil War hero, General [[Winfield Scott Hancock]], nicknamed "Hancock the Superb," but defeated [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] candidate in the [[1880 United States presidential election|1880 presidential election]].

Fabricating shops and foundries were established in Brainerd, Minnesota, a town named by the N.P. second President John Gregory Smith for [[Lawrence Brainerd]], the father of his wife Anna Elizabeth Brainerd and a close friend and colleague. It was here further back on the line where the Railway established its first temporary offices and headquarters. A severe stock market crash and financial collapse in the East after 1873, led by the [[Credit Mobilier Scandal]] and the [[Union Pacific Railroad]] stock fraud, caused a nationwide economic recession and financial panic in New York City's Wall Street financial district, stopping further railroad building for twelve years during the latter 1870s and early 1880s.

In 1886, the company restarted and put down {{convert|164|mi}} of main line across the northern Dakotas, with an additional {{convert|45|mi}} from the west in Washington Territory. On November 1, General [[George Washington Cass]] (formerly of the U.S. Army), became the third president of the company. General Cass had been a vice-president and on the board of directors earlier of the [[Pennsylvania Railroad]], one of the major dominant Eastern lines and would lead the Northern Pacific through some of its most difficult times in the later 19th century.

Attacks on survey parties and construction crews as they approached the Yellowstone region by [[Sioux]], [[Cheyenne]], [[Arapaho]], and [[Kiowa]] native warriors in northern Dakota and Minnesota Territories became so prevalent that the company received protection from additional mounted troops in units of the U.S. Army.<ref>{{cite magazine| first=John M.| last=Lubetkin| title='No Fighting is to be Apprehended": Major Eugene Baker, Sitting Bull, and the Northern Pacific Railroad's 1872 Western Yellowstone Surveying Expedition| magazine=Montana: The Magazine of Western History| date=2006| volume=56| issue=2| pages=28–41}}</ref>