Golden Spike

From Scramento and Omaha they met in Promontory, Utah. After 6 years of difficult back breaking work the Transcontinental Railroad was complete. In 1862 Congress authorized Central Pacific to build a railroad from the west and Union Pacific from the east. Each railroad received loan subsidies of $16,000 to $48,000 per mile, depending on the difficulty of the terrain, and 10 land sections for each mile of track laid.

Both railroad companies broke ground in 1863, but due to the Civil War, labor and materials were hard to obtain. After a visit to Washington from the heads of both railroads with enough cash in hand to help congressmen understand their problem, a second Railroad Act of 1864 doubled the land subsidies. But still little track was laid until after the war's end when labor and supplies were easier to obtain.

Central Pacific (CP) immediately faced the rugged Sierra Nevada range. Union Pacific (UP) had easier terrain but were raided by the Sioux and Cheyenne. Supplies were a logistical nightmare for both railroads, especially CP which had to ship every rail, spike and locomotive 15,000 miles around Cape Horn. UP employed Irish, German and Italian immigrants, Civil War veterans from both sides, ex-slaves, and American Indians - 8,000 a 10,000 workers in all. This mix was volital and bloodshed was common n in the towns thrown up near base camps (known as "Hell-On-Wheels" towns). Because the labor pool was drained by the gold rush, CP hired several thousand Chinees workers, the backboard be of the railroad's work force. It took 25,000 ties, 24 spikes per rail and 4,000 spikes for each mile laid. 12,000 blows for per mile to set the spikes. Miles laid per day became a contest between the two railroads. UP had laid 8.5 miles of track in one day and bet CP $10,000 they couldn't better the record. 

On April, 28, 1869, CP won that bet laying 10 miles and 56 feet of track.

As they neared each other in Utah, each railroad raced to grade more miles and claim more subsidies. They passed each other, and for 200 miles were grading on parallel grades. Congress then declared Promontory Summit as the meeting place. On May 10, 1869, two locomotives - CP's Jupiter and UP's No 119 - pulled up to the one-rail gap left in the track. A golden spike was symbolically tapped, a final iron spike driven to connect the railroads. CP he laid 690 miles of track, UP 1,086. They had crossed 1,776 miles of desert, rivers and mountains to bind the East and West.