Transcontinental railroad

On this day in 1869, the two sides of the first transcontinental railroad met in Promontory, Utah. What started as a competition between two dueling companies, ended with nearly 2,000 miles of track and the first railroad line that stretched the entire width of the United States. Learn more in our Trains Unit!

railroad

Southern Pacific Railroad advertisement from 1885. The company was founded in 1865 as a land holding company and became a railroad when it acquired the Central Pacific in 1885. The Central Pacific had employed as many as 12,000 emigrant Chinese laborers to build the railroad line from California to Utah where the "golden spike" was laid in 1869 to form the first transcontinental railroad. Utah was the connecting place with the Union Pacific railroad which had been built west from Council…

In a new travelling exhibition, the significance of the transcontinental railroad, finished in 1869, will be celebrated in a series of images capturing its arduous construction through to its triumphant completion

The swift, often comfortable ride on the Transcontinental Railroad opened up the American West to new settlement.

The Chinese Railroad Workers

Locomotive 210, built in 1892 by Brooks Locomotive Works for the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton Railway

The Central Pacific began laying track eastward from California in 1863 . they all started working together and building these railroads.

How did they do this back then

In this photograph by Alfred Hart taken between 1865 – 1869, a Native American looks down upon a newly completed section of the Transcontinental Railroad, 435 miles from Sacramento, California. The stark composition of both man and progress facing a distant haze conveys emotions as complex as the cultural impact behind America’s westward expansion. The railroad was a massive undertaking, with three companies building the 3,069 km (1,907 mi) line over six years. With the final “Golden Spike”…

Transcontinental Railroads and Land Grants circa 1850-1900 AD

From Appalachia History, "Gandy Dancers" by Dave Tabler (7 January 2008) -- Before railroad work was completely mechanized in the 1950s, railroad calls were an everyday part of the track worker’s ritual. Most of these gandy dancers—the label applied to railway line workers who maintained railroad tracks and kept the rails straight—were African Americans who adapted the work call to railroad work. The term is said to be from the dance-like movements of the spikedriver, plus the name of…

Central Pacific Railroad local time schedule for 1873, offering train and boat service from San Francisco and Sacramento.

History buffs and railroad enthusiasts alike will enjoy learning about the Transcontinental Railroad with this Wild West worksheet!

The Chinese and the Iron Road: Building the Transcontinental, produced by the Chinese Historical Society of America and the Chinese Railroad Workers Project at Stanford University, is on display through February 29, 2016 in Geisel Library on the University of California, San Diego campus.

Effect of Railroads on the United States: Bound Counties Together and Allowed…

The First Transcontinental Railroad's completion marked the first time in history the United States offered an efficient mode of transportation from coast-to-coast.

Jake Lee watercolor Chinese building transcontinental Railroad Commissioned by Johnny Kan

The Central Pacific Railroad disappeared long ago but is long remembered as the western component of the Transcontinental Railroad, completed in May of 1869.