Ambrose, Stephen E., Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869, Simon & Schuster, 2000.

In his book, Ambrose, a noted historian, examines the political and social efforts that helped to build the transcontinental railroad, including Abraham Lincoln's driving desire to see it built, the government members and brilliant entrepreneurs who invested in it, the Irish and Chinese laborers who did most of the construction work, and the Army soldiers who stood guard, protecting the rail crews from attacks.

Bondeson, Jan, Buried Alive: The Terrifying History of Our Most Primal Fear, W. W. Norton & Co., 2001.

This fascinating study gives a thorough exploration of the factual history of, and urban legends about, premature burial, including the increase of associated tales in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It also discusses the development of many safeguards such as waiting mortuaries, where corpses were kept until...