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• Transport historiography: features and sources
• What kind of transport history do we need?
• The origins and developments of transport history in Europe and America
• Transport History in Italy

Transport historiography: features and sources

In the first half of the XIXth century, trains and steam boats applied mechanical energy to the means of conveyance, making it possible to win the uncertainty of transports, until then depending on the weather conditions. Therefore the security and regularity of travels were granted, as never realized before the industrial revolution. In the first years of the XXth century the speed was then exalted, thanks to the arrival of the aeroplane and the motor car.

The motor car became the symbol of the freedom of movement in the industrialized countries, but also the most important consumer product, leaving an indelible imprint in the society of the last 50 years.

In spite of its exceptional change in the last two centuries and in spite of its very great influence in the daily life of people, transport remained in the background of the debate and the historiographical researches. While other sectors, as politics or industry, were studied minutely, the events of transport were disregarded in Italy and very few local and regional analysis were produced about the mobility networks.

Transport history has elements of economic history, of social history, of business history, of historical geography, of industrial archaelogy and perhaps is deprived of an its own methodology, which depends on the kind of research carried out; but surely all historians who deal with transport, need a consistent knowledge of the technics used in each period to understand the working of transport systems.

For transport historians the sources represent one of the main difficulties. They are loose, rarely well catalogued and the records are normally dedicated to the development of only one carrier or infrastructure, so that sources almost never show the whole circulation of persons and commodities, not even in a limited area. On the contrary, transports need to be studied in their wholeness and in their relations with society, in the widest sense of the term.

The transport world is indeed very rich of events, data, suggestions, phenomena of short and long duration, but its study must be inserted in the history of society, in order to comprehend its evolution. For its nature, transport is linked to all other sectors, because it allows them to move and to have reciprocal connections.

Whereas, explaining and interpreting recent or past facts, we are used to think in a “statical way”, as if the means of conveyance don't influence other events. For this reason we tend, sometimes unconsciously, to neglect the fact that transport was always fundamental in the progress of society, one of the most important tools of economic and social modernization.

Among the sources, must be quoted the records of the Ministry of Public Works and the Treasury, and the records preserved in the State Archives in each province, which often contain the correspondences exchanged between local and central authorities for the building of infrastructures, also showing the political pressures in the background of the many realizations. Moreover, the historical archives of Communes and Provinces are usually full of projects on this subject, giving idea of the complex studies necessary for transports. The records of enterprises are of great utility, too, when they are catalogued adequately; the records of banks present crucial information about the flows of financing; even the judiciary records have an importance, regarding the disasters due to transports and the bankruptcy of transport firms. Also the numerous pamphlets printed by technicians, politicians and local committees, today kept in most libraries, are very interesting as sources for transport history. Moreover technical reviews, which reported news of projects and buildings, and local newspapers, often very attentive to the achievements in the transport field, because it was a very warm theme for people. Finally all the travel and tourism literature, where can be found basic elements to understand the function of transport in society.