[1][2][3] Due to financial troubles following the Panic of 1907, the system was never completed as a fully transcontinental line.
[9] Both Harriman and Hill were involved in the Northern Securities Company antitrust litigation during this time.
Gould sought to avoid similar litigation by acquiring control of railroads that could be chained together at their endpoints to make a longer system; under Gould's plan, Missouri Pacific Railroad would become a holding company owning the other lines in the system.
[11] But as many of the eastern roads controlled by Gould entered receivership after 1907 despite receiving investment funds from John D. Rockefeller,[12][13][14] and Gould's ouster from Missouri Pacific leadership in 1915,[15][16] the complete transcontinental plan fell apart.
At its peak the system stretched from San Francisco to Pittsburgh, and comprised the following railroads: