Transcontinental Railroad Essay 

Megan Thurber

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Transcontinental Railroad

Facts- Histroynet.com
This sight gave me information like how long the railroad was, the years it was built in and who built it. This source gave me the information I might  use in the introduction or conclusion of my essay. 

Chinese labor- pbs
I used this source to learn about the Chinese labor during the Transcontinental railroad. I learned that they were much better workers than the Irish and American. They were also much healthier
. 

Building it- digital history
I used this sight to learn all about how the railroad was built. This sight had so much info and I thought it was one of the most important things to learn about the railroad. It helped me the most and gave me the best information.

Facts- eyewitnesshistory
This sight did not give me new information so I just wrote down some broad facts that I found in this sight. Most of the facts were about building the railroad and what it did for America.

Economic affect and doc- shmoop
I used this sight to get an overview of the the economic affect. I did this after I used the pbs sight because that one had so much information. I wanted to be able to pick out the important parts.

Economic affect- pbs
I used this sight to find in depth detail about the economic affect of the railroad. There was a lot of information and this was the main sight that I used for the economic affect.
  

Timeline- pbs
I used this source to get a good idea of when things were happening. So much was going on during the building of the railroad that is got confusing. This sight helped me sort my information.

Primary source bonds- cprr
This primary source showed me a picture of what a bond looked like. The government gave the Union Pacific and Central Pacific bonds in order to be able to afford the building of the railroad.

Map of railroad- memorty.loc
This source showed me a really cool picture of where the Union Pacific built their half of the railroad. They covered more land than the central pacific and had a ,uh easier time building. This was because they did not have to blast holes through mountains.

Big 4- pkwy
I used this source to learn about the main people behind the building of the railroad. They were called the "Big Four". For the Union Pacific Durant and Dodge were in charge. For the Central Pacific Huntington and Judah were in charge. 

The Golden Spike was driven by Stanford symbolizing the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. 

Mostly Irish immigrants worked for the Union Pacific.

The first Transcontinental railroad was complete on May 10, 1869

Most of the workers that worked on the railroad were Chinese immigrants. 

Most of the Transcontinental railroad was made by hand.

Tunnels were dug into the Sierra Nevada Mountains. 

This is a map of the Union Pacific. 

This is a newspaper from May 16, 1870 about the Transcontinental Railroad. 

The Transcontinental Railroad

                The Transcontinental railroad was built from 1863 to 1869. It was one of the greatest accomplishments in American history. It was 1,776 miles long and said to have “made the world smaller”. It changed almost everything about America, like the Indian’s way of life, and our way of life. There were many positive and negative affects to building the railroad, the economic impact and the Chinese labor.

                The Transcontinental railroad was built by two companies, the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific. The Central Pacific build east from Sacramento California, while the Union Pacific built west from Omaha Nebraska. The Central Pacific had a much harder time building the railroad because they had to blast holes through the Sierra Nevada mountains with black powder and nitroglycerin. This took so they they averaged one foot a day with three shifts nonstop.The government helped pay for this enormous project with bonds. The Union Pacific and Central Pacific raced to finish. The main people working on the railroad were Irish, Chinese immigrants, and freed slaves. The building of the railroad was a positive thing because of the changes it made along with some new catch phrases like “Times up!”, “Times a wasting!”, and “The train is leaving the station!”.  They put a golden spike in the ground as the last spike of the railroad to finish the job. The building of the railroad also brought great expansion to the west and the economy shot up.

                The economy of the United states changed drastically after the railroad was built. Travel was made easy and cheap. People were traveling the the west bringing their money with them, so the west was rapidly catching up with the north. Fifty-million dollars with of trade was shipped from coast to coast every year. This caused the production of companies to boom. One of the negative aspects of building the railroad was “Doctor Durant’s Plan. He owned credit Mobilier and was vice president of the Union Pacific, so he stole money from Union Pacific every time they paid his company.  This is now illegal but at the time it was not and Union Pacific almost went bankrupt, which would have ruined everything. Another negative effect of this was the Indians way of life was ending. I thing that from an American point of view the railroad was the start of something great and revolutionary, but from the Indians point of view it was the end if their way of life. Not only did it take their land but many more buffalo died for the railroad. The railroad was said to have “bound the Union together”, but only for Americans. Many immigrants did not feel this way, especially the Chinese.

                We can thank the Chinese immigrants for the railroad. They are the ones who built most of it. They made up eighty percent of the work force. Their work ethic was amazing. On April 28, 1868, the Chinese built ten miles of railroad led by Charels Crocker. This was the positive turning point in for the Chinese, people started to see that they were very useful people who deserved respect. Crocker especially changed his point of view when he said, “wherever we put them, we found them good”. Before this they were called “the dregs of Asia”, by Leland Strobridge, but really they worked better than anyone else. They did not drink, they ate healthy, and they worked for less than anyone else. The Chinese were paid thirty dollars a month without food or shelter while everyone else was paid thirty-five dollars a month with food and shelter included. This part of the railroad was positive because it changed the way America saw the Chinese.

                The building, economic impact, and Chinese labor were all positive aspects of the Transcontinental railroad. They changed America for the better. Travel went from coasting thousands of dollars and months long to coasting five- hundred dollars and under a week. In one of my primary sources you can see the coast of one ticket to travel across the country. The Transcontinental railroad was one of our greatest accomplishments with many positive effects as well as negative affects like a corrupt business and an economic boom.