Chartered in Kansas in 1863, the Atchison spread west, southwest, south, and northeast. It received some aid from the state of Kansas in the shape of a grant of lands, but depended primarily on the investment of private capital. Kansas itself was not, in 1870, a very encouraging field for railroad building. It had been admitted as a state only in 1861, and could boast for the most part of less than two inhabitants to the square mile;—although settlement was pushing westward with considerable rapidity, and stores of mineral wealth had been discovered in Colorado. The railroad in those days had to create its own traffic, and population followed the means of transportation. The peculiarity of Kansas was a central position, which lent itself to schemes of the most far-reaching nature. A railroad reaching from one end of the state to the other might almost equally well have been extended to California, to Chicago, or to the Gulf; and could be sure in time, if it survived, of the carriage of a vast volume of traffic out in every direction from the Central West. The Atchison managers saw this opportunity, and courageously and persistently endeavored to realize it;—part of the project they announced, and part they kept back till the fitting time should come. The systematic extension of the Atchison Railroad may be divided into four parts: (1) The construction through Kansas to Colorado, to save the charter, then down the valley of the Rio Grande to Albuquerque. (2) The securing of a connection with the Pacific Coast by construction, lease, or traffic agreement. (3) The connection with the Gulf. (4) The connection with Chicago. As the system neared completion, and its territory came to be invaded by other roads, there were added to this systematic extension what may be called competitive extensions, consisting largely in the construction of branch lines, and multiplied beyond anything which the country could need for years to come. This sort of building was most prominent from 1884 to 1888 and will be considered in its place.