CENTRAL PACIFIC RAILROAD Photographic History Museum   Click to ENTER the CPRR Museum*

Jubilation Laying the Last Rail

Faster Home Exhibits History FAQ's Links

Rights & Permissions; Homework

FASTER Download (Smaller Pictures) Museum HOMEPAGE EXHIBITS Index —Favorite CPRR Stereographs —Hart Stereoviews —New York Public Library —Muybridge Stereoviews —Union Pacific Railroad —Unknowns —Railroad Maps —Engravings —Ephemera and Collectibles —Nelson's Guidebook, 1871 —Railroads Shipped by Sea —Locomotive Falcon Stereograph Catalogs READ ABOUT —Lewis M. Clement Biography —Eastward to Promontory ... Chinese Railroad Workers Book List Online Books Hopkins RR Library Catalog Links to other websitesWebrings Frequently Asked Questions How you can help / plans What's New Technical Notes Special Requests User Agreement Site Map CPRR.org Welcome (This Page)E-mail Search Internet

---

Translate: Español - Français - Deutsch - Italiano - Português - Chinese - Japanese - Korean - Legalese

Transcontinental Railroad History

Overcoming incredible obstacles, transcontinental railroad construction finished 7 years ahead of schedule!

Don't miss the thousands of transcontinental railroad pictures in the Exhibits!

Sacramento, Cal. waterfront—Pacific Railroad western terminus—the first spike: "Sacramento Railroad Station" 1874 painting by William Hahn. Courtesy UC Berkeley, Digital Library Project.

HOMEWORK PICTURES Teachers see: Great Railroad Race Game for School Kids &  Lesson Plans RR BOOKS ONLINE

“Lewis Clement had achieved a triumph of the first magnitude in engineering.  The Summit Tunnel was 7,042 feet above the sea. This was the highest point reached by the CP.  The facings were off by only two inches, a feat that could hardly be equaled in the twenty-first century.  Clement had done it with black powder, nitroglycerin, and muscle power.  He had not used electric or steam-driven drills, steam engines to power scoop shovels, or any gas or electric-powered carts or cars to haul out the broken granite.  There were no robots, no mechanical devices.  Well over 95 percent of the work was done by the Chinese men.  They and their foremen and the bosses, Clement and Crocker and Strobridge, had created one of the greatest moments in American history.” “More than a dozen tunnels were blasted through the granite mountains. Most were on curves, laid out by Lewis Clement. When the faces met, they were never more than an inch off line, showing the remarkable accuracy of his calculations and instrument work under the most difficult of circumstances. Van Nostrand’s Engineering Magazine said in 1870 that the undertaking was preposterous, but Clement did it.”  —Stephen E. Ambrose, “Nothing Like It in the World The Men Who Built The Transcontinental Railroad 1863 - 1869”

The idea for a transcontinental railroad "to shrink the continent and change the whole world" was first proposed by men of imagination in 1830. It wasn't until 1862 that Congress passed a bill authorizing such a venture. In 1869, after a long, bitter and often terrifying struggle against Indian attacks, brutal weather, floods, labor shortages, political chicanery, lawlessness and a war, the first transcontinental railroad finally became a reality. Now the way was open for vast expansion and social changes that would make America the industrial giant of the world. ... One of the great engineering feats of history and ... a fascinating chapter in the development of our country.
[After Rails Across the Continent: The Story of the First Transcontinental Railroad by Enid Johnson.]  Text Courtesy Walt Winter.

An 1846 Cincinnati newspaper mocked the utopian claims that a railroad could "create settlements, commerce and wealth"; the project's supporters, the paper suggested, might as well be promising "to unite neighboring planets in our solar system and make them better acquainted with each other."
["Looking at the Transcontinental Railroad as the Internet of 1869" by Edward Rothstein, New York Times, December 11, 1999.] Text Courtesy David Bain. [Interview]

Photography was a critical marketing tool for financing with transcontinental railroad bonds – both the CPRR and UPRR hired photographers to document the progress of construction, producing the numerous stereoviews which now illustate this website. The camera equipment of the day was so large and heavy that a photo wagon was needed. Wet glass plate collodion negatives had to be produced in the field, required long exposures, and albumen paper required 20 minutes in sunlight to make photo prints. Today's digital cameras by comparison are a marvel — to select the best camera to create photographs for the CPRR Museum website, we found invaluable the extensive reviews on a great site for digital cameras, Digital Camera HQ.

“The Chinese made the roadbed and laid the track around Cape Horn.  Though this took until the spring of 1866, it was not as time-consuming or difficult as had been feared.  Still it remains one of the best known of all the labors on the Central Pacific, mainly because, unlike the work in the tunnel, it makes for a spectacular diorama.  As well it should.  Hanging from those [ropes], drilling holes in the cliff, placing the fuses, and getting hauled up was a spectacular piece of work.  The white laborers couldn't do it.  The Chinese could, if not as a matter of course, then quickly and — at least they made it look this way — easily.  Young Lewis Clement did the surveying and then took charge of overseeing the railroad engineering at Cape Horn. “What Clement planned and the Chinese made became one of the grandest sights to be seen along the entire Central Pacific line. Trains would halt there so tourists could get out of their cars to gasp and gape at the gorge and the grade.”  —Stephen E. Ambrose, “Nothing Like It in the World The Men Who Built The Transcontinental Railroad 1863 - 1869”

I

II

Click images to view the two parts of the movie. Courtesy Internet Movie Archive.

Driving the Last Spike    (Savage and Ottinger carte de visite.)    Courtesy C. Wesley Cowan.

CENTRAL PACIFIC RAILROAD Photographic History Museum (CPRR.org) Click here to ENTER the Museum   Museum Bookshop Help with your support! >> Praised as "the best RR website on the planet." Top

Macintosh creator Jef Raskin's book shows how the Web, computers, and information appliances can be made much easier to learn and use! A COMPUTER SCIENCE MUST READ.

---

Many thanks to generous contributor:

---

Track workers on a hand car in the Utah desert. (E. & H.T. Anthony Stereoview #7148.) See enlargement and "3D" Stereo. Echo Canyon Utah with the rock that A. J. Russell labeled "Great Eastern" in the background.  [Digital image restoration of railroad pictures.] The hand hewn ties are another giveaway that it's on the Union Pacific Railroad.  Location  identified courtesy Don D. Snoddy, UPRR. Also visit the National Stereoscopic Association

Search this site! powered by FreeFind Racing to Build the Pacific Railroad: "...So work on as though Heaven was before you and Hell behind you." From a letter written by the Central Pacific's C. P. Huntington to Charley [Crocker],  dated July 1st, 1868.   Previous Site Home Site Next Site Skip Previous Site Random Skip Next Site [Previous 5 Sites] [List All Sites] [Next 5]   This History Ring site is owned by CPRR.org Want to join The History Ring? [Skip Prev] [Prev] [Next] [Skip Next] [Random] [Next 5] [List Sites]