|
Historic Research |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
By John Sutton, Park Technician (1978) Construction of the First Transcontinental Railroad was as challenging to our nation as putting a man on the moon. Each was THE great national feat of its age. The two railroads, the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific, and their leaders, had an enormous task before them: to build a railroad across 1,800 miles of unsettled country. Enormous manpower, material and money was needed to accomplish this feat. The biggest problem of construction was financing the costs. The Federal Government paid $16,000 for level terrain, $32,000 for intermountain, and $48,000 for mountains per mile for completed track. 1 Liberal government subsidy bonds and land grants were made available to the companies. To make money, the companies had to lay track in the quickest and cheapest manner. Organization of the company manpower was the key to success. The man responsible for the CP's construction was James Harvey Strobridge, a tall, hard-driving New Englander. On the UP, the Casement brothers, Dan and Jack, contracted with the company for tracklaying for about $900 per mile. 2 These men developed very similar means of laying track which was rapid, sure and systematic. The most advanced work parties from the main body were surveyors who determined the best route of travel. Following the surveyors were bridge builders and tunneling crews. Next came the graders who cut into hillsides, filled depressions and leveled the trackbed. The majority of the workmen employed were on the grading crews, as all the work had to be done with simple tools such as picks and shovels. The tie men came next and evenly spaced from 2, 260 to 2,640 ties to the mile, depending on grade and alignment. 3 All the above was done before actual track laying by the spiking crews. And behind that crew were the auxiliary workers, such as cooks, clerks, teamsters, and trackcar loaders. The actual "iron laying" was a finely tuned system. Each man had a certain job to perform which maximized speed and efficiency, and resulted in an assembly-line approach to the problem. The work began when small horse-drawn, flat -topped cars arrived at the railhead. Each car carried sixteen rails, and the proper number of spikes, "fishplate" joints and bolts. A block of wood was placed by two men under the wheels to act as a brake. The team of horses was unhitched and returned for another load, usually at a gallop. An average of eight men, four to a rail, stepped forward and seized a rail. Rollers at the side edges of the car helped facilitate removal. Other men distributed the spikes, plates, and bolts. Grasping the rail either by iron tongs or gloved hand, the husky men lugged it to its resting place. The back end was dropped first and when approximately aligned the front. These "Iron Men" or "Rust Eaters" as they were called, returned to the iron car for another rail. Men using wooden gauges made sure the rails were properly spaced. Three men using iron pry bars simultaneously shifted the rail to the desired alignment. This shifting was at the command of the foreman. Once in place, spikers pounded two spikes per rail, per tie; one inside, the other outside. Meanwhile, other men joined the rails by means of two iron "fishplates" and four bolts per rail. Nuts for the bolts were attached to the outside. At this time, the spikes and nuts were only partially driven and tightened to hold the rail in place. When the rail was satisfactorily anchored, the iron car was moved onto the new section of rail where the process was repeated. When the rail car advanced one more time, a crew came in and finished the spiking and nut tightening. In the beginning, on the CP, white laborers were used to perform these tasks. Eventually, Chinese immigrants replaced them. When all the rails were taken off a car, it was tipped on its edge off the track to let the next full cars advance. It was later replaced on the tracks and returned for another load. Behind the track-layers, a crew filled the spaces between ties with dirt and gravel ballast. This was done to fully anchor the track. This crew also straightened and perfected the track. Further behind this crew was another who met the trains and unloaded building material. Ties were shipped to the front by wagons, and iron by the special cars. If it was necessary to bend track for a curve, the normally rapid system was slowed somewhat. Track was bent by placing it on two heavy ties and pounding it with sledge hammers until it was curved to the desired requirements. The peak of track laying on the Pacific Railway came April 28, 1869, just twelve days before the rails joined at Promontory Summit. Earlier, the Union Pacific crews had laid over eight miles of track in one day and boasted their feat could not be bettered. Charles Crocker, president of construction, was determined to top the UP. On April 27th the CP crews tried, but a broken engine early in the day halted the attempt. The next day the men were successful in laying ten miles and eight hundred feet of track; a record which still stands. 4 The site of the completion of this feat is within the park, on the west tour, four miles southwest of the Visitor Center. Although less known, but just as important to the railroad story was the telegraph line construction along the same route. Material was brought by trains, then transferred to wagons for distribution. While crossarms were being attached to the poles, gangs dug holes. The poles were erected and the wire and insulators brought forward. As the wagon moved down the line, wire unwound from a reel. A wire gang raised the wire and fastened it to insulators at the crossarms. Great rivalry existed between the telegraph gang and the track layers, the former sometimes being delayed by a lack of poles. When this happened, anything available was put to use: sticks, bushes, scrap lumber and stolen ties. Although the track laying is one of the most colorful aspects of the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad, only about one-fourth of the men were actually employed there. The operation took literally an army of manpower. Graders, teamsters, herdsmen, hunters, cooks, bakers, blacksmiths, carpenters, masons, lumbermen, bridge-builders, surveyors, engineers, railroad men, telegraphers and clerks all were an integral part of the scheme. 1. Todhunter Ballard, Trails of the Iron Horse, Building the Impossible, p.55. 2. Mayer and Vose, Makin' Tracks, p. 68. 3. Galloway, The First Transcontinental Railway, p. 141. 4. Ibid, p. 159. |
|||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
