590 CHAPTER 20

ONE AMERICAN’S STORYAh Goong was one of thousands of Chinese workers on

the Western railroads in the late 1800s. In some places,

the workers had to blast rock from a cliff wall. The

lightest Chinese were lowered in wicker baskets

hundreds of feet to the blasting site. Years later, Ah

Goong’s granddaughter described her grandfather’s job.

A VOICE FROM THE PAST

Swinging near the cliff, Ah Goong . . . dug holes, theninserted gunpowder and fuses. . . . The basketmensignaled one another to light the fuses. He struckmatch after match and dropped the burnt matchesover the sides. At last his fuse caught; he waved, andthe men above pulled hand over hand hauling him up,pulleys creaking.

Maxine Hong Kingston, China Men

This section discusses the building of the railroads.

Deciding to Span the ContinentAmericans had talked about building a transcontinental railroad—onethat spanned the entire continent—for years. Such a railroad wouldencourage people to settle the West and develop its economy. In 1862,Congress passed a bill that called for two companies to build a transconti-nental railroad across the center of the United States.

The Central Pacific, led by Leland Stanford, was to start in Sacramento,California, and build east. The Union Pacific was to start in Omaha,Nebraska, and build west. To build the railroad, these two companies hadto raise large sums of money. The government lent them millions of dol-lars. It also gave them 20 square miles of public land for every mile of trackthey laid. The railroad companies could then sell the land to raise money.

With the guarantees of loans and land, the railroads attracted manyinvestors. The Central Pacific began to lay its first track in 1863. The

Chinese immigrants—like the one at thelower left—helpedbuild several railroadsin the West.

22

Railroads Transform the Nation

MAIN IDEA WHY IT MATTERS NOW TERMS & NAMES

The railroads tied the nation

together, speeded industrial growth,

and changed U.S. life.

The railroad first made possible

our modern system of shipping

goods across the country.

ConstitutionalConvention

James Madison

Virginia Plan

New Jersey Plan

Great Compromise

Three-FifthsCompromise

Taking Notes

Use your chart to take notes aboutthe growth of railroads.

➛ ➛

➛➛

Benefits ofGrowth

Problems ofGrowth

Cause Cause Cause

Cause CauseCause

➛ ➛ ➛

GROWTH OF INDUSTRY AND RAILROADS

CALIFORNIA STANDARDS

8.6.2 Outline the physical obstaclesto and the economic and politicalfactors involved in building a net-work of roads, canals, and railroads(e.g., Henry Clay's AmericanSystem).

8.12.1 Trace patterns of agriculturaland industrial development as theyrelate to climate, use of naturalresources, markets, and trade andlocate such development on a map.

8.12.3 Explain how states and thefederal government encouragedbusiness expansion through tariffs,banking, land grants, and subsidies.

8.12.4 Discuss entrepreneurs, indus-trialists, and bankers in politics,commerce, and industry (e.g.,Andrew Carnegie, John D.Rockefeller, Leland Stanford).

CST3 Students use a variety ofmaps and documents to identifyphysical and cultural features ofneighborhoods, cities, states, andcountries and to explain the histori-cal migration of people, expansionand disintegration of empires, andthe growth of economic systems.

Union Pacific laid its first rail in July 1865 (after theCivil War had ended).

Building the RailroadThe Central Pacific faced a labor shortage because mostmen preferred to try to strike it rich as miners. Des-perate for workers, the Central Pacific’s managers over-came the widespread prejudice against the Chinese andhired several dozen of them. The Chinese were smalland weighed, on average, no more than 110 pounds.But they were efficient, fearless, and hard working.

They also followed their own customs, which led toan unexpected benefit for the railroad company. TheChinese drank tea instead of unboiled water, so theywere sick less often than other workers. Pleased withthe Chinese workers, the company brought more menover from China. At the peak of construction, morethan 10,000 Chinese worked on the Central Pacific.

The Union Pacific hired workers from a variety ofbackgrounds. After the Civil War ended in 1865, for-mer soldiers from both North and South flocked towork on the railroad. Freed slaves came, too. But one ofthe largest groups of Union Pacific workers was immi-grants, many from Ireland.

Both railroads occasionally hired Native Americans.Washos, Shoshones, and Paiutes all assisted the race ofthe rails across the deserts of Nevada and Utah.

Railroads Tie the Nation TogetherOnly short, undergrown trees dotted the vast open space. To the southshimmered the Great Salt Lake. In the east rose the bluish shapes of theRocky Mountains. Across that space, from opposite directions, theworkers of the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific toiled. By May 10,1869, Central Pacific workers had laid 690 miles of track. Union Pacificworkers had laid 1,086 miles. Only one span of track separated the twolines at their meeting point at Promontory, Utah.

Hundreds of railroad workers, managers, spectators, and journalistsgathered on that cool, windy day to see the transcontinental railroadcompleted. Millions of Americans waited to hear the news by telegraph.A band played as a Chinese crew and an Irish crew laid the last rails. Thelast spike, a golden one, was set in place. First, the president of theCentral Pacific raised a hammer to drive in the spike.After he swung the hammer down, the crowd roared withlaughter. He had missed. The vice-president of the UnionPacific took a turn and also missed. But the telegraphoperator couldn’t see and had already sent the message:“done.” People across the nation celebrated.

RAILROAD CAMPS

Union Pacific workers oftenworked 12-hour days. Gradershad the job of leveling theroadbed. After a day of hardlabor, they slept in small dirtshanties like the one below.

Track layers lived together ingroups of 100 to 135, in railroadcars with three layers of bunkbeds. The cars were parked atthe end of the just-finished track.Workers ate in a dining car withtheir plates nailed to the table.They gobbled a quick meal ofbeef, beans, and bread. As soonas one group of 125 workers wasdone, the next group filed in.

This golden spikeunited the CentralPacific and UnionPacific Railroads.

An Industrial Society 591

BackgroundBoiling water kills germs.

A. DrawingConclusions Whydid the UnionPacific have alarger supply ofworkers?A. PossibleResponsebecause its start-ing point wascloser to the East,the most popu-lated part of thecountry

B. Reading a MapUsing the map onpage 592, findthe Union Pacificand CentralPacific Railroads.Notice how theyconnect Omahato Sacramento.

The Union Pacific-Central Pacific line was the first transcontinentalrailroad. By 1895, four more U.S. lines had been built across the conti-nent. Between 1869 and 1890, the amount of money railroads earnedcarrying freight grew from $300 million to $734 million per year.

Railroad TimeThe railroads changed America in a surprising way: they altered time.Before the railroads, each community determined its own time, based oncalculations about the sun’s travels. This system was called “solar time.”Solar time caused problems for people who scheduled trains crossingseveral time zones and for travelers.

A VOICE FROM THE PAST

I have been annoyed and perplexed by the changes in the time schedules of connecting railroads. My watch could give me no information as to the arrival and departure of trains, nor of the time for meals.

John Rodgers, quoted in Passage to Union

To solve this problem, the railroad companies set up standard time.It was a system that divided the United States into four time zones.Although the plan went into effect on November 18, 1883, Congressdid not adopt standard time until 1918. By then, most Americans sawits benefit because following schedules had become part of daily life.

0

0

300 Miles

600 Kilometers

EasternCentralMountainPacific

Time Zones

Lake Superior

Lak

eMic

higa

n

Lake Huron

Lake Erie

LakeOntario

A T L A N T I CO C E A N

P A C I F I CO C E A N

120°

W

115°

W

110°

W

105°

W

100°

W 95°W

90°W

85°W

80°W

75°W

30°N

35°N

40°N

45°N

50°N

25°N

Centra l Pac

ific

Great Northern

Union Pacific

Northern Pacific

Southern Pacific Railway Atch

ison

, Topeka

&Sa

ntaFe

Illinois

Central

Pennsylvania

South

ernRailw

ay

New York Central

Texas & Pacific

Seattle

PortlandButte

Albuquerque

TucsonEl Paso

FortWorth

Los Angeles

San FranciscoDenver

Boston

New York

St. Paul Minneapolis

Chicago

Memphis

Savannah

Louisville

Indianapolis

Detroit

Cleveland

Atlanta

St. Louis

Salt LakeCity Sacramento

Topeka

Omaha

Fargo

KansasCity

RichmondWashington, D.C.

Baltimore

Philadelphia

Buffalo

Pittsburgh

Albany

New Orleans

Nashville

Wilmington

Norfolk

Railroads of the Transcontinental Era, 1865–1900

GEOGRAPHY SKILLBUILDER Interpreting Maps1. Region Were there more railroads in the Eastern or Western half of the country?2. Place What do you think each of the four time zones was named for?

BackgroundCanada had alsobuilt a transcon-tinental railroad,so there were sixaltogether.

SkillbuilderAnswers1. Eastern2. Eastern andCentral—positionin country;Mountain—RockyMountains andother ranges;Pacific—the nearbyocean

592

Economic and Social ChangesThe railroads changed people’s lives in many other impor-tant ways. They helped create modern America.

1. Linked the economies of the West and East.From the West, the railroads carried eastward rawmaterials such as lumber, livestock, and grain.Materials like these were processed in Midwest-ern cities such as Chicago and Cleveland. (SeeGeography in History on pages 598–599.) FromEastern cities, in turn, came manufactured goods,which were sold to Westerners.

2. Helped people settle the West. Railroads werelifelines for settlers. Trains brought them lumber,farm equipment, food, and other necessities andhauled their crops to market.

3. Weakened the Native American hold on theWest. As Chapter 19 explained, the railroads car-ried hunters who killed off the herds of buffalo.They also brought settlers and miners who laidclaim to Native American land.

4. Gave people more control of the environment.Before railroads, people lived mainly where therewere waterways, such as rivers. Roads were primi-tive. Railroads made possible cities such as Denver,Colorado, which had no usable waterways.

Just as railroads changed life for many Americans inthe late 1800s, so did big business. You will read aboutbig business in Section 3.

2. Using GraphicsUsing a chart like the onebelow, record which groupsof people helped build thetranscontinental railroad.

Which group worked onboth railroads? (HI1)

3. Main Ideasa. Why did the federal gov-ernment want a transconti-nental railroad built? (HI2)

b. How did the governmentencourage the building ofthe railroad? (HI2)

c. Why was standard timecreated? (HI2)

4. Critical ThinkingRecognizing EffectsWhich of the trends startedby railroads are still part ofthe modern business world?(HI2)

THINK ABOUT• railroads’ effect on time• the way they linked the

economy• the way they changed

where people settled

1. Terms & NamesExplain the

significance of:• transcontinental

railroad• standard time

Section Assessment

ACTIVITY OPTIONS

ARTTECHNOLOGY

You have been asked to honor those who built the transcontinental railroad. Designa memorial or create the opening screen of a multimedia presentation. (REP1)

2

RAILROAD HEROES

Several American songs cele-brate railroad heroes. One tellsof Casey Jones, an engineer whosaved lives. He slammed on thebrakes as his train rounded abend and plowed into a stalledfreight train. He died but slowedthe train enough to save hispassengers.

Another song tells of a mythi-cal worker named John Henry,shown below. This ballad cele-brates an African American’sstrength in a track-laying raceagainst a steam-driven machine.

An Industrial Society 593

C. PossibleResponsePositive—linkingthe economies,settling the West,and controllingthe environment.Negative—weak-ening NativeAmerican hold onthe West.

C. EvaluatingWhich of thesefour changes doyou think werepositive, andwhich werenegative?

Central Pacific Union Pacific