West Auto Tour

Visitor Center Films Ranger Presentations Big Fill Walk Auto Tour Steam Locomotives Nearby Attractions	Ten Miles In One Day    Here on April 28, 1869 the Central Pacific established a record that has never been equaled. The Union Pacific once laid eight and one half miles of track in a single day and boasted that their feat could not be matched. Charles Crocker, Central Pacific construction superintendent, was determined to beat that record. He shrewdly waited until the distance between the two companies was so short that the Union Pacific could not try again. A correspondent from the San Francisco Evening Bulletin described the event: "The scene is a most animated one. From the first pioneer to the last tamper, perhaps two miles, there is a thin line of 1,000 men advaancing a mile an hour; the iron cars, with their living and iron freight, running up and down; mounted men galloping backward and forward. Far in the rear are trains of material, with four or five locomotives, and their water-tanks and cars.... Keeping pace with the track-layers was a telegraph construction party, hauling out, and hanging, and insulating the wire, and when the train of offices and houses stood still, connection was made with the operator's office, and the business of the road transacted...." Ten miles, fifty-six feet of track were laid. It was an orchestration of humanity as magnificent as the Pacific Railroad effort itself. The iron rail used by the railroads came in twenty-eight foot sections and weighed fifty-six pounds per yard. Eight Central Pacific tracklayers, supported by hundreds of other workers, carried all of the rail on that record setting day. If each man carried his fair share he hefted 123 tons between sunrise and sunset. Relief tracklayers were standing by but the first crew was so proud of their work that a rest was not requested.