Construction of the first rail network in the United States began in 1828. The first section was opened in 1830 and stretched 13 miles (21 kilometers). By 1835 there were over 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) of railroad in operation
along the Atlantic seaboard. Construction then moved toward the Midwest, eventually connecting the cities along
the Mississippi River with eastern ports. When gold was discovered in California, railroad construction increased
by six times its previous production rate. By means of rails, the country was soon connected from coast to coast,
which had a major impact on business and travel within the United States.

the railroad was .

A: experimental
B: undesirable
C: luxurious
D: advantageous

Read the passage from animal farm. one sunday morning squealer announced that the hens, who had just come in to lay again, must surrender their eggs. napoleon had accepted, through whymper, a contract for four hundred eggs a week. the price of these would pay for enough grain and meal to keep the farm going till summer came on and conditions were easier. when the hens heard this, they raised a terrible outcry. they had been warned earlier that this sacrifice might be necessary, but had not believed that it would really happen. they were just getting their clutches ready for the spring sitting, and they protested that to take the eggs away now was murder. for the first time since the expulsion of jones, there was something resembling a rebellion. led by three young black minorca pullets, the hens made a determined effort to thwart napoleon's wishes. their method was to fly up to the rafters and there lay their eggs, which smashed to pieces on the floor. napoleon acted swiftly and ruthlessly. he ordered the hens' rations to be stopped, and decreed that any animal giving so much as a grain of corn to a hen should be punished by death. the dogs saw to it that these orders were carried out. for five days the hens held out, then they capitulated and went back to their nesting boxes. nine hens had died in the meantime. their bodies were buried in the orchard, and it was given out that they had died of coccidiosis. whymper heard nothing of this affair, and the eggs were duly delivered, a grocer's van driving up to the farm once a week to take them away. which detail from the passage supports the claim that this is an allegory for the great purge? the hens holding out for five days but capitulating the eggs being delivered to the grocer the protesting hens being intentionally starved coccidiosis spreading on the farm

Amanda bought a prom dress which she considered the most beautiful dress ever made. adjective clause: word(s) modified:

Read the passage, then answer the question that follows. no one could have seen it at the time, but the invention of beet sugar was not just a challenge to cane. it was a hint—just a glimpse, like a twist that comes about two thirds of the way through a movie—that the end of the age of sugar was in sight. for beet sugar showed that in order to create that perfect sweetness you did not need slaves, you did not need plantations, in fact you did not even need cane. beet sugar was a foreshadowing of what we have today: the age of science, in which sweetness is a product of chemistry, not whips. in 1854 only 11 percent of world sugar production came from beets. by 1899 the percentage had risen to about 65 percent. and beet sugar was just the first challenge to cane. by 1879 chemists discovered saccharine—a laboratory-created substance that is several hundred times sweeter than natural sugar. today the sweeteners used in the foods you eat may come from corn (high-fructose corn syrup), from fruit (fructose), or directly from the lab (for example, aspartame, invented in 1965, or sucralose—splenda—created in 1976). brazil is the land that imported more africans than any other to work on sugar plantations, and in brazil the soil is still perfect for sugar. cane grows in brazil today, but not always for sugar. instead, cane is often used to create ethanol, much as corn farmers in america now convert their harvest into fuel. –sugar changed the world, marc aronson and marina budhos how does this passage support the claim that sugar was tied to the struggle for freedom? it shows that the invention of beet sugar created competition for cane sugar. it shows that technology had a role in changing how we sweeten our foods. it shows that the beet sugar trade provided jobs for formerly enslaved workers. it shows that sweeteners did not need to be the product of sugar plantations and slavery.