Chinese Contribution To First
Continental Railroad in US
Sik-Lam Wong黄锡林
Berkeley, CA
September 2012
For Private Use Only
Trains: Humble Beginning
• Steam engine started in the UK in 1804 and
trains started to show up in the US in 1830
• Initially, trains were built like covered wagons,
running on straps of metal
– Passenger in the front would be exposed to heat,
smoke and ember, and people in the back would be
freezing
• Later trains would be enclosed and railroad
tracks were laid
Railroads: “Highways” for
Commerce and Troops
• Railroads expanded quickly in US
and by 1860 there were 22,000
miles of tracks in northern US, and
9,000 miles of tracks in the South
• Railroads were greatly expanded
during the American Civil War
(1861-1864) to move troops and
supplies to the front lines
• Sabotage of trains during the Civil War
• Atlanta was destroyed by Gen.
Sherman during his “March to the
Sea” because it was a major
railroad hub
First Transcontinental Railroad: Uniting the
United States
• Need to connect California and the West to the East
gained momentum due to the discovery of gold in
California and silver in Colorado, and as a way to unite
the country during the Civil War
– Lincoln signed Pacific Railroad Act in 1862 authorizing building
of the first transcontinental railroad from the Missouri River
(Council Bluffs, Iowa/Omaha, Nebraska) to California
(Sacramento)
– Government loans of $16k, $32k and $48k per mile depending
on the grade, and land grants of 10 sq. miles, later increased to
20 sq. miles per mile of track
– Union Pacific owned by Thomas Durant would build from the
Missouri River
– Central Pacific started by the Big Four (Stanford, Crocker,
Hopkins, Huntington) would build from California
First Continental Railroad: From Council
Bluffs To Sacramento
First Transcontinental Railroad Followed
By Others
• Building started in 1866 and ended in 1869
– Central Pacific and Union Pacific met up at
Promontory Summit in Utah on May 10,
1869
– First Transcontinental Railroad officially
completed in November 1869
• Later the Southern Pacific was constructed
linking Sacramento to LA and then to New
Orleans
• Northern Pacific was built to connect Seattle
with Chicago
• Most of the railroad tycoons were shady
characters: Vanderbilt, Durant, Stanford,
Crocker, Huntington, Hopkins etc
– Corruption was commonplace
Central Pacific and Huntington & Hopkins
Buildings at Old Sacramento
Central Pacific Railroad at Old
Sacramento
Central Pacific Railroad Depot at Old
Sacramento
Union Pacific Train at Old Sacramento
Railroads Built By Immigrants
• Union Pacific used mainly Irish labor
• Central Pacific used local labor but quickly ran out of
manpower
– Recruited some Chinese laborers from the gold mines at about
$1 per day and found them very hard-working
– Recruited more Chinese laborers from China at lower wages
• Chinese laborers staged first labor strike to gain some increase in
pay
– Two-thirds of Central Pacific work force were Chinese
• Many Chinese laborers died during construction
especially due to the use of the unstable explosive:
nitroglycerin and from avalanche (雪崩)in the winter
Chinese Workers Building
Central Pacific Railroad
Chinese Workers Building
Central Pacific Railroad
Chinese Workers Building
Central Pacific Railroad
Chinese Support Worker
Bringing Water/Tea
Chinese Workers Building
Central Pacific Railroad
Changes Brought About by
Railroads
•
Conflict with native Americans
– Over a million bisons, used by the native Americans for food, were
killed because they stopped the trains
– Native Americans saw the railroads and land grants infringing on their
land
Changes Brought About by
Railroads
• Hobos: free-spirited people catching a free ride on freight trains
• Cowboys and cattle drives
– Cowboys would round them up and drive them from ranch to the
nearest railhead for transportation by train
Changes Brought About by
Railroads
• Railroads help to unite the US as one country
• Migration of people from Europe to the West to
settle in the land
– Land granted to the railroad companies were sold at
attractive prices to attract people to settle in the West:
they needed people and goods to use the trains
• Railroad money also resulted in the building of
some of the best universities in the US
• Trains, cowboys and Indians are all part of US
popular culture: in movies and songs
This presentation is for private use
only and not for public distribution
This presentation is based on material available in the
public domain from the Internet