Bringing East and West Together PDF

“Bringing East and West Together” (9 Good Habits for All Readers) Introduction: The United States seems much smaller now than it did in 1850. Today, we can fly across the U.S. in hours. Or we can drive from New York to California in several days and stay in...

“Bringing East and West Together” (9 Good Habits for All Readers) Introduction: The United States seems much smaller now than it did in 1850. Today, we can fly across the U.S. in hours. Or we can drive from New York to California in several days and stay in comfortable motels every night along the way. But in 1850, few people traveled from the East Coast to the West. The trip was too long and too dangerous. There were no airplanes or cars or motels to make it easier. There weren’t even any trains. The “roads” were bumpy dirt paths. People traveled slowly, by horse or covered wagon. Back then, ships were the best way to carry heavy loads, such as lumber, from one place to another. However, ships could go only where the rivers went. After the steam locomotive was invented in 1850, trains could go anywhere there were tracks. By 1854, railroad tracks had reached only from the Atlantic Coast to the Mississippi. Businessmen began to talk about continuing the tracks all the way to the West Coast. Getting Started: In 1862, Lincoln signed the Railroad Act to build the first transcontinental railroad. The Union Pacific Railroad Company would start laying tracks in Omaha, Nebraska, and move west. The Central Pacific Railroad Company would start in Sacramento, California, and move east. They would meet in Utah. There the two tracks would connect into one railroad. Laying the tracks was stopped until the Civil War ended in 1865. Months later, a race began. Each railroad company wanted to lay more track than the other one. This was because the government also received huge areas of land along the track they laid. The Chinese Contribution: Both companies had a problem, however. They couldn’t find enough men for the hard work. At that time, not many people lived in California. The Central Pacific Railroad took a chance and hired some Chinese immigrants. “The Chinese are too small,” some people warned. “They’re not strong enough!” Yet the Chinese were soon laying track faster and straighter than the other workers. In no time, almost every Chinese man in California was working for the railroad. Nearly 80 percent of the Central Pacific workers were Chinese. The workers lived on a train that followed them down the track they had just laid. The locomotive pulled boxcars with built-in bunks. The train also had a “chuck wagon” car, where meals were cooked. More cars carried lumber, rails, spikes, and other materials. Working From East to West: The Union Pacific workers laid about a mile of track a day across the Great Plains. They each earned $2 a day. If they could lay an extra half-mile of track, they were paid $3!  The workers suffered through the blizzards that swept across the plains. They also faced the angry Plains Indians. These Native Americans know the railroad would help end their way of life. In fact, the government was giving away land that belonged to the Native Amerians. To protect the railroad workers, the government sent the cavalry, who shot any Indians they saw. Working From West to East: The Central Pacific crews worked more slowly. They faced an enormous obstacle: the Sierra Mountains! Sometimes they used dynamite to blast their way through. Sometimes they made tunnels into the rock with picks and shovels. During the winter of 1867, they had to burrow under the snow just to reach a tunnel entrance. They chipped away at the rock 24 hours a day. Deep inside the mountain, workers rarely saw the sun. While one group dug the tunnel, another group of Central Pacific workers crossed the mountains. Their job was to lay track on the east side, where the track would come out of the tunnel. Before they left, these workers took apart three locomotives and forty railroad cars. They dragged those pieces and tons of other material on sleighs over the snow-covered mountains. Each iron rail weighed 600 pounds! Yet the men dragged enough material over the mountains to lay 50 miles of track the following spring. Haste Made Waste---Also Great Wealth: As both companies raced to lay track, they began to take shortcuts. The Central Pacific workers laid track around hills. Later, it cost millions of dollars to straighten out curves in the track. During the winter of 1868, the Union Pacific workers hammered rails into ice. When the ice melted, large sections of track gave way. However, the men who headed up the companies became millionaires. They were called the “Big Four,” and many people hated them because of the way they treated their workers. Their names were Colis P. Huntington, Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker, and Mark Hopkins. Reaching the End: By the late spring of 1869, the workers from the two railroad companies could see each other. They were nearing Promontory Point, Utah. On May 10, 1869, the two sections of track met, thanks to the work of 20,000 men. The two locomotives of the railroad companies faced each other; nearly touching. Their trip to this spot had taken three years and over 1,175 miles of new track. A band played for the huge crowd that had come to celebrate. Finally, the boss of the Central Pacific tried to hammer in a golden spike to connect the two sections of track. He missed! Then the boss of the Union Pacific tried. He also missed! One of the workers finally hammered the spike into place. That spike completed the first transcontinental railroad. This achievement would change the United States forever. The new railroad would help spread people from coast to coast.