America's first transcontinental railroad (known originally as the "Pacific Railroad" and later as the "Overland Route") was a continuous railroad line built between 1863 and 1869 that connected the existing eastern U.S. rail network at Council Bluffs, Iowa, with the Pacific coast at the Oakland Long Wharf on San Francisco Bay.Vernon, Edward (Ed) "Travelers' Official Railway Guide of the United States and Canada" Philadelphia: The National General Ticket Agents' Association. June, 1870, Tables 215, 216 The rail line was built by three private companies over public lands provided by extensive U.S. land grants.Pacific Railroad Act of 1862, §2 & §3 Building was financed by both state and U.S. government subsidy bonds as well as by company-issued mortgage bonds.Pacific Railroad Act of 1862, §5 & §6 The Western Pacific Railroad Company built of track from the road's western terminus at Alameda/Oakland to Sacramento, California. The Central Pacific Railroad Company of California (CPRR) constructed east from Sacramento to Promontory Summit, Utah Territory. The Union Pacific Railroad (UPRR) built from the road's eastern terminus at the Missouri River settlements of Council Bluffs and Omaha, Nebraska, westward to Promontory Summit.Executive Order of Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, Fixing the Point of Commencement of the Union Pacific Railroad at Council Bluffs, Iowa, dated March 7, 1864 (38th Congress, 1st Session SENATE Ex. Doc. No. 27).Cooper, Bruce C., "Riding the Transcontinental Rails: Overland Travel on the Pacific Railroad 1865–1881" (2005), Polyglot Press, Philadelphia, . p. 11."Appleton's Railway and Steam Navigation Guide". New York: D. Appleton & Co., December 1870. p. 236.
The railroad opened for through traffic between Sacramento and Omaha on May 10, 1869, when CPRR President Leland Stanford ceremonially tapped the gold "Last Spike" (later often referred to as the "Golden Spike") with a silver hammer at Promontory Summit.Bowman, J. N. "Driving the Last Spike at Promontory, 1869 California Historical Society Quarterly, Vol. XXXVI, No. 2, June 1957, pp. 96–106, and Vol. XXXVI, No. 3, September 1957, pp. 263–274.Hill, Thomas "The Last Spike" San Francisco: Thomas Hill (privately published). January 1881. In the following six months, the last leg from Sacramento to San Francisco Bay was completed. The resulting coast-to-coast railroad connection revolutionized the settlement and economy of the American West. It brought the western states and territories into alignment with the northern Union states and made transporting passengers and goods coast-to-coast considerably quicker, safer and less expensive.Schwantes, Carlos A. and Ronda, James P. The West the Railroads Made, pp. 4-5, 9, 11, 28-9, 91, 105, 127, University of Washington Press, Seattle and London, 2008.
The first transcontinental rail passengers arrived at the Pacific Railroad's original western terminus at Alameda Terminal on September 6, 1869, where they transferred to the steamer Alameda for transport across the Bay to San Francisco. The road's rail terminus was moved two months later to the Oakland Long Wharf, about a mile to the north, when its expansion was completed and opened for passengers on November 8, 1869. Service between San Francisco and Oakland Pier continued to be provided by ferry.
The CPRR eventually purchased of UPRR-built grade from Promontory Summit (MP 828) to Ogden, Utah Territory (MP 881), which became the interchange point between trains of the two roads. The transcontinental line became popularly known as the Overland Route after the name of the principal passenger rail service to Chicago that operated over the length of the line until 1962.Cooper, Bruce Clement (Ed), The Classic Western American Railroad Routes. New York: Chartwell Books (US) / Bassingbourn: Worth Press (UK); 2010. ; BINC: 3099794. pp. 44–45.
Overall significance Railroads not only increased the speed of transport, but also dramatically lowered its cost. The first transcontinental railroad resulted in passengers and freight being able to cross the country in a matter of days instead of months and at one tenth the cost of stagecoach or wagon transport. With economical transportation in the West (which had been referred to as the Great American Desert) now farming, ranching and mining could be done at a profit. As a result, railroads transformed the country, particularly the West (which had few navigable rivers).Athearn, Robert G. Rebel of the Rockies: A History of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, pp. 4-5, 16-25, Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut, 1962.Beebe, Lucius and Clegg, Charles. Narrow Gauge in the Rockies, p. 31, Howell-North, Berkeley, California, 1958.Davidson, James West, et al. American Nation: Independence Through 1914, p. 304, Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, 2000. .Blum, John M. et al. The National Experience: A History of the United States, pp. 298-9, Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., New York, New York, 1963.
For example, before the railroads were built in the West, if a farmer were to ship a load of corn only 200 miles to Chicago, the shipping cost by wagon would exceed the price for which the corn could be sold.Schwantes, Carlos A. and Ronda, James P. The West the Railroads Made, pp. 91, 105, 127, University of Washington Press, Seattle and London, 2008. .Wilson, O. Meredith. The Denver and Rio Grande Project, 1870-1901, p. 2, Howe Brothers, Salt Lake City, Chicago, 1982. .Wells, David A. Recent Economic Changes, pp. v, vi, 19, 40-42, 89, D. Appleton and Company, 1889, Alpha Editions, 2019. . So, under such circumstances, farming could not be done at a profit. Mining and other economic activity in the West were similarly inhibited because of the high cost of wagon transportation. One Congressman, referring to the West, bluntly stated that, “All that land wasn’t worth ten cents until the railroads came.”Holbrook, Stewart H. The Story of American Railroads, p. 5, Bonanza Books, New York, New York, 1947.Athearn, Robert G. Rebel of the Rockies, A History of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, p. 5, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1962.
Freight rates by rail were a small fraction of what they had been with wagon transport. When the United States concluded the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, people thought that it would take 300 years to populate it. With the introduction of the railroad, it took only 30 years. The low cost of shipping by rail resulted in the Great American Desert becoming the great American breadbasket.Kiger, Patrick J. “10 Ways the Transcontinental Railroad Changed America,” History.com, July 25, 2023, p. 2, A&E Television Networks, (https://www.history.com/news/transcontinental-railroad-changed-america ). Retrieved December 31, 2024.Schwantes, Carlos A. and Ronda, James P. The West the Railroads Made, 4-5, 9, 10, 28, 79, 91, 113, 123, 125-6, University of Washington Press, Seattle and London, 2008. .Holbrook, Stewart H. The Story of American Railroads, pp. 157, 189, Bonanza Books, New York, New York, 1947.Jensen, Oliver. The American Heritage History of Railroads in America, pp. 7, 32, 104, American Heritage Publishing Company, Inc., New York, 1975.Wells, David A. Recent Economic Changes, pp. v, vi, 19, 40-42, 89, D. Appleton and Company, 1889, Alpha Editions, 2019. .Schwantes, Carlos A. and Ronda, James P. The West the Railroads Made, 4-5, 9, 10, 28, 79, 91, 113, 123, 149, 154-6, 169, University of Washington Press, Seattle and London, 2008. .Cooley, Everett L. “The Last Spike is Driven,” Utah Historical Quarterly, Winter 1969, Vol. 17, No. 1, pp. 4, 14-15, National Golden Spike Centennial Commission.Clarke, Thomas Curtis, et al. The American Railway: Its Construction, Development, Management and Appliances, pp. 358-9, 431, 436-41, Castle Division of Book Sales, Inc., Secaucus, New Jersey, 1889, 1988. .
Origins
Among the early proponents of building a railroad line that would connect the coasts of the United States was Dr. Hartwell Carver, who in 1847 submitted to the U.S. Congress a "Proposal for a Charter to Build a Railroad from Lake Michigan to the Pacific Ocean", seeking a congressional charter to support his idea.Carver, Dr. Hartwell "Proposal for a Charter to Build a Railroad from Lake Michigan to the Pacific Ocean" Washington, D.C., January 18, 1847, Centpacrr.com"Dr. Hartwell Carver's Proposal to Build a Railroad from Lake Michigan to the Pacific Ocean" CPRR.orgCarver's 1847 proposal records himself as having written a newspaper article on the subject in 1837. Some sources say that he wrote such an article in 1832.
Preliminary exploration
Congress agreed to support the idea. Under the direction of the Department of War, the Pacific Railroad Surveys were conducted from 1853 through 1855. These included an extensive series of expeditions of the American West seeking possible routes. A report on the explorations described alternative routes and included an immense amount of information about the American West, covering at least . It included the region's natural history and illustrations of reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals."Reports of Explorations and Surveys, to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, made under the direction of the Secretary of War, in 1853–4." 12 Volumes. Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1855–61
The report did not include detailed topographic maps of potential routes needed to estimate the feasibility, cost and select the best route. However, the survey was detailed enough to determine that the best southern route lay south of the Gila River boundary with Mexico in mostly vacant desert, through the future territories of Arizona and New Mexico. This in part motivated the United States to complete the Gadsden Purchase.Woodward, C. Vann "Reunion and Reaction: The Compromise of 1877 and the End of Reconstruction". Oxford: Oxford University Press (1991) p. 92
In 1856, the Select Committee on the Pacific Railroad and Telegraph of the US House of Representatives published a report recommending support for a proposed Pacific railroad bill:
Possible routes The U.S. Congress was strongly divided on where the eastern terminus of the railroad should be—in a southern or northern city.Zelizer, Julian E. (Ed) "The American Congress: The Building of Democracy". Kerr, K. Austin, Chapter 17: Railroad Policy (pp. 286–297). New York: Houghton Mifflin Co. (2004). p. 288 Three routes were considered: A northern route roughly along the Missouri River through present-day northern Montana to Oregon Territory. This was considered impractical because of the rough terrain and extensive winter snows.Later, the Northern Pacific Railway (NP) found and built a better route across the northern tier of the western United States from Minnesota to the Pacific Coast. It was approved by Congress in 1864 and given nearly of land grants, which it used to raise money in Europe. Construction began in 1870 and the main line opened all the way from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Ocean on September 8, 1883. A central route following the Platte River in Nebraska through to the South Pass in Wyoming, following most of the Oregon Trail. Snow on this route remained a concern. A southern route across Texas, New Mexico Territory, the Sonora desert, connecting to Los Angeles, California. Surveyors found during an 1848 survey that the best route lay south of the border between the United States and Mexico. This was resolved by the Gadsden Purchase in 1853.Gadsden Purchase, 1853–1854 U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian.The southern route was constructed in 1880 when the Southern Pacific Railroad crossed Arizona territory.