While traveling to court this financial backing, Judah contracted yellow fever in Panama and died, becoming an oft-forgotten driving force of the first transcontinental railroad. Unfortunately, however, Judah butted heads with these men and sought the help of Eastern investors, namely Cornelius Vanderbilt, instead. He preached the railroad gospel to any who would listen, convincing a group of Sacramento businessmen and shopkeepers to invest in his operation, which led to the incorporation of the Central Pacific Railroad with Leland Stanford, Collis Huntington, Mark Hopkins and eventually Charles Crocker as major backers. The prospect of a railroad from coast to coast excited one young engineer in California, Theodore Judah, who took on the task of surveying a likely route through the Sierra Nevadas. Not surprisingly, that was the reason a southern route through more favorable terrain and weather was not built first. Surprisingly, the Civil War sped up the process of building the railroad, Davis noted, because predominantly northern legislatures could approve a route and pass land grant acts to aid the railroads without facing objections from their southern counterparts. “The process of planning a transcontinental railroad, selecting a route and actually building it took a long time, especially as politicians could not agree on a route.” government wanted to bridge the gap between the rising populations of the West with the more established East,” Davis explained. This historic photo shows track work taking place the day before the big ceremony, Promontory Summit, Utah, | Photo courtesy of Utah State Historical Society, St. One of the main motivations for building a transcontinental railroad was the California Gold Rush, Southern Utah University history professor Laura June Davis said.
With that realization, talk of a rail line that would span the width of the continent began to gain traction. in the 1830s, then started to grow exponentially when the realization of their potential power soaked in. Railroads began to emerge in the Eastern half of the U.S. It is easily at the top of the list of events with major national significance and repercussions that happened in Utah.Īnd just as modern-day children (and even adults sometimes) say or think that oft-heard impatient refrain, the top brass down to the graders and track layers of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific probably thought the same thing as they built the grand iron rail that linked the nation from sea to sea a century and a half ago:
Instead, it’s an extremely significant spot where hordes of history buffs have descended to witness reenactments or other festivities marking the beginning of the golden age of transportation in the United States. Without the important event that transpired there, that’s all it would be and practically no one would visit. To many, “the middle of nowhere” seems a perfect description of this remote area. Just like Bart Simpson, that’s what many parents might hear from their children as they drive out to Promontory Summit in Box Elder County just north of the Great Salt Lake to see the spot where the first transcontinental railroad became reality on May 10, 1869. FEATURE - “Are we there yet?” The rails looking to the west from the spot where the original golden spike was driven, Golden Spike National Historic Park, Promontory Summit, Utah, Ap| Photo by Reuben Wadsworth, St.
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