The Big Four and the Transcontinental Railroad

00:00:10
Speaker 1: This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories. Before the advent of the Transcontinental Railroad, a journey across the continent meant a dangerous six-month trek over rivers, deserts, and mountains. Alternatively, a traveler could hazard a six-week sea voyage around Cape Horn or sail to Central America and cross the Isthmus of Panama by rail, risking exposure to any number of deadly diseases in the crossing. This is the story of the men known as the Big Four who incorporated the Central Pacific Railroad and helped build the Transcontinental Railroad. These four individuals risked their businesses, money, time, and talent in order to achieve an unprecedented feat of engineering, vision, and courage. Here to tell the story is Roger McGrath. McGrath is the author of Gunfighters, Highwaymen, and Vigilantes: Violence on the Frontier. A U.S. Marine and former history professor at UCLA, Dr. McGrath has appeared on numerous History Channel documentaries, and he is a regular contributor for us here in Our American Stories. Here’s McGrath.

00:01:18
Speaker 2: During the late nineteenth century, Leland Stanford, Collis Huntington, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker became so powerful in California that they were known simply as the Big Four. Their power came from building the Central Pacific Railroad, which accounted for the western half of our nation’s first Transcontinental Railroad. Now, the Big Four didn’t start out life as the Big Anything, but like tens of thousands of others, came to California during the Gold Rush years. They didn’t even strike gold, at least not in the traditional sense. Their gold came from mining the miners, that is, supplying the miners with dry goods, hardware, tools, firearms, and the other necessities of life on the frontier. From this modest beginning, they rose to dominate life in California to a degree not seen before or since.

00:02:15
Speaker 3: This is their story.

00:02:18
Speaker 2: Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker were born in New York State; Collis Huntington in Connecticut. Three of the four grew up on farms. All spent their childhoods in humble circumstances and worked hard. The Gold Rush brought them to California as young men. All soon turned from digging for gold to establishing businesses in Sacramento. They became fast friends and were soon a force to be reckoned with. In Sacramento, the new state capital, Crocker became a city councilman. Stanford would later become governor. They were alert to every new business opportunity, especially the possibility of building a railroad across the

00:03:03
Speaker 3: continent to California.

00:03:07
Speaker 2: Talk of building a railroad to the Pacific Coast began in 1845 when Asa Whitney, a New York businessman, proposed the idea to Congress. Whitney suggested the government grant a sixty-mile-wide strip of land between Lake Superior and the Oregon Coast to any company willing to risk construction. In 1845, Whitney’s plan was far ahead of its time. Nonetheless, Whitney launched a campaign to convince both congressmen and the general public that the railroad not only could be built but was a necessity. Well, within a few years, most people were convinced a transcontinental railroad could be built, but was it a necessity? There was a small population of Americans in Oregon’s Willamette Valley and businessmen who traded with the Orient. They would be able to avoid the voyage around Cape Horn. But was that enough to justify such a project? The California Gold Rush put an end to the necessity question. Tens of thousands of Americans rushed to California, and it became a state in 1850, so suddenly that California skipped the territorial stage. Within a few years, there were 400,000 Americans in California. Without question, there was now a need to connect California with the rest of the United States. Now the question became which route to California

00:04:37
Speaker 3: should the railroad take?

00:04:39
Speaker 2: Northerners argued for a northern route and Southerners for a southern one. Unfortunately, this was the antebellum decade, and North-South antagonism was at a fever pitch. Congress could not decide upon a route. The Big Four followed the debates over the railroad closely. They were astute businessmen, and they knew they would profit handsomely from a railroad connection with the East. They took an interest in Theodore Judah, a young railroad engineer and promoter who was building the Sacramento Valley Railroad, a short line that ran from Sacramento into the Gold Country. At the same time, Judah was thinking he needed partners with money and political influence. Even before he finished with the Sacramento Valley Railroad, Judah was thinking of a Transcontinental Railroad. He wanted to build the far western end of the railroad from Sacramento, over the Sierras, to Nevada.

00:05:40
Speaker 3: He would need partners and money.

00:05:44
Speaker 2: Judah and the Big Four joined forces, in charge of the Central Pacific Railroad, announcing plans to build over the Sierras to Nevada. They wanted both federal support and the promise of a rail line to connect their railroad with the Mississippi Valley. The Four sent Judah to Washington to lobby Congress. Judah proved an effective lobbyist, and in 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railroad Act, which provided for the first Transcontinental Railroad. The Pacific Railroad Act decreed that two companies would build the rail line. The Central Pacific Railroad would build eastward from Sacramento across the Sierras to Nevada. The Union Pacific Railroad would build westward from Omaha, Nebraska, climb the Rockies near South Pass, Wyoming, and follow the Humboldt River to the California-Nevada line. Each road was granted a 400-foot-wide right-of-way, together with ten alternate sections of land for each mile of track laid. A section of land was 640 acres or one square mile. In addition to the land, the railroads would receive government guarantees to loan the companies, on a first mortgage basis, $16,000 for each mile of track built in level country, $32,000 a mile in the foothills, and $48,000 a mile in the mountains. With the passage of the Pacific Railroad Act, Theodore Judah returned to California. Almost immediately, disagreements arose with the Big Four. Judah presented his construction plans for the railroad. They were too grandiose for his partners, who were in this to turn a profit, not build an engineering marvel. Judah was terribly upset that he would have to compromise his vision for a monumental project and headed east to see if he could attract investors who

00:07:48
Speaker 3: would buy out the Big Four.

00:07:51
Speaker 2: Judah took a steamer from San Francisco to Panama and then crossed overland to the Caribbean Coast of Panama to catch another steamer to New York. Like thousands who took this route, he contracted yellow fever in Panama. He arrived in New York in poor condition. Within days, he was dead. This left the Central Pacific Company in the hands of the Big Four.

00:08:20
Speaker 3: The Big Four were very much alike.

00:08:22
Speaker 2: Each was from what was called “Old American stock.” Each was born and reared in the East in humble circumstances, and came to California in the Gold Rush. Each was intelligent, disciplined, and energetic, and was willing to work relentlessly. Each was highly ambitious and convinced that his goal in life was the pursuit of wealth. With four such hard-charging individuals, one would think that conflict was inevitable. Fortunately for the Big Four, each proved ideally suited for a different role in the Central Pacific Company. Leland Stanford became the company president and the public relations chief in California. He was the company spokesman in seeking subsidies from the state and county governments. Collis Huntington stepped into Judah’s place as the Washington lobbyist and the chief money raiser in the East. Mark Hopkins managed the money and accounted for every penny spent. He restrained his partners from making imprudent moves. Charles Crocker supervised construction. In later years, Crocker liked to remind his partners that whatever they had done, he had actually built the railroad.

00:09:41
Speaker 1: And when we come back, we’ll continue with this remarkable story of these four different Easterners who united the country with the Transcontinental Railroad. Roger McGrath continues this story here on Our American Stories. And we continue here with Our American Stories and with Roger McGrath and the story of the Big Four in the building of the Transcontinental Railroad.

00:10:44
Speaker 3: Railroad.

00:10:46
Speaker 2: Forty miles of track had to be laid before the first federal subsidy was collectible. This was difficult because of the Civil War. Materials were at inflated prices. Round-the-Horn shipping charges were sky-high. Again, the labor supply was limited by the Civil War. The booming Nevada silver and gold mines meant full employment. At this time, the Big Four’s own resources were modest. Their Big Four status was years in the future. Moreover, investors were not eager to buy stock in the Central Pacific Company because the federal government held a first mortgage guarantee

00:11:29
Speaker 3: on the company.

00:11:30
Speaker 2: This meant should the company go bankrupt, the government got first dibs on the company’s assets. Leland Stanford scored the first victory in 1862. He began serving as governor of California. He convinced the state government to buy $1.5 million worth of stock in the Central Pacific Company. Now, this would be considered a conflict of interest today, but in 1862, it was considered a good move by the state. California desperately needed a railroad to connect it with the East, and the Central Pacific Company was the one designated to build the California portion of the railroad by Congress. Most people at the time thought Stanford and his partners would benefit from the stock purchase. Okay, but California would benefit far more if a railroad were built. Collis Huntington then scored a second victory. In 1864, Congress amended the Pacific Railroad Act. The land grant was doubled, and most importantly, the government reduced the security for its loans from a first to a second mortgage. Now private investors were willing to risk their money with a first mortgage guarantee. Finally, Crocker solved the labor problem. At first, Crocker relied upon white Californians, mostly immigrant Irish and Germans. The wage scale had to be relatively high, and many of the men looked upon railroad work as a way to earn a grubstake and then go off to gold and silver strikes in Nevada. The labor turnover was excessive. Crocker now decided to try the Chinese. The Chinese were already a familiar figure in California, comprising about five percent of the general population and some ten percent of the mining population. There were several powerful Chinese businessmen in San Francisco and in Sacramento who acted as labor contractors. Crocker negotiated with them, and they supplied him with workers. By the end of 1865, Crocker had some 6,000 Chinese workers, and double that number by 1868. It’s important to understand that white railroad workers were not fired and replaced by cheap Chinese laborers. The construction crews were being expanded so rapidly that no one lost his job. With the financial and labor problems solved, the pace of construction accelerated, and the Big Four, all astute businessmen, began thinking of not stopping at the California-Nevada state line but laying track across Nevada. Collis Huntington’s lobbying efforts paid off again in 1866. He convinced Congress to again amend the Pacific Railroad Act and allow the Central Pacific Company to continue building eastward until the Central Pacific met the Union Pacific,

00:14:44
Speaker 3: wherever that might be.

00:14:47
Speaker 2: By 1868, the Central Pacific was building across Nevada. Compared with building through the Sierras,

00:14:53
Speaker 3: this was a piece of cake.

00:14:55
Speaker 2: Tracks were laid for half the amount of the government’s subsidy. This more than made up for losses in the Sierras. Nonetheless, there were difficulties. The costs of rails, locomotives, cars, blasting powder, and Round-the-Horn shipping were sky-high. Moreover, in the Nevada deserts, there was no timber for ties and trestles. The needed lumber had to be brought in from the Sierras. Meanwhile, the Union Pacific was well underway. Like the Central Pacific, construction was slow at first, as the company struggled to obtain workers and material from a nation

00:15:35
Speaker 3: consumed by the Civil War.

00:15:37
Speaker 2: By the close of 1865, only forty miles of track stretched westward from Omaha. During the next two years, though, conditions improved rapidly. First, Grenville Dodge, a U.S. Army general who campaigned against Indians on the Great Plains and knew the country well, got a leave of absence from the Army and was hired as the Union Pacific’s chief engineer. Second, Irish Civil War veterans began to drift westward. With the close of the war, Grenville quickly hired these hard-drinking, hard-fighting Irish war veterans to fill the construction crews. All was still not smooth sailing on the Great Plains. All materials had to be brought into that barren country. Ties from the forests of Minnesota, stone from the quarries of Wisconsin, and rails from the mills of Pennsylvania. Moreover, several different tribes of Plains Indians were on the warpath. Work was frequently halted while construction crews grabbed rifles to beat off attacks. By the spring of 1868, the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific realized they were engaged in the greatest race in history. The Central Pacific was winging its way across the desert of Nevada. The Union Pacific was working its way across the high plains of Wyoming and through Lone Tree Pass in the Rockies. Between the two railroads lay Utah, which the federal government had defined as mountain country, although much of the route the railroad would take was perfectly flat. In Utah, the railroads were thus entitled to subsidies of $48,000 a mile, while building over relatively flat terrain. Each company spurred its men on relentlessly in hopes of grabbing off a major share of

00:17:38
Speaker 3: the Utah prize.

00:17:41
Speaker 2: The Central Pacific built 360 miles of road in 1868, the Union Pacific 425. The pace of construction became feverish. In 1869, the Union Pacific laid six miles of track in one day. The Central Pacific countered with seven; the Union Pacific laid seven and a half miles, and the Central matched it.

00:18:09
Speaker 3: Then the Union Pacific

00:18:11
Speaker 2: laid an astounding eight and a half miles of track in one day. At this point, Thomas Durant, the president of the Union Pacific, asked Charles Crocker if he thought the Central Pacific could top that eight and a half miles. The two wagered $10,000, equal to a million dollars in today’s money.

00:18:36
Speaker 1: And when we come back, we continue with this remarkable story, and my goodness, the story of the Chinese workers and the former Civil War vets who just happened to be Irish. We hear that story told by Stephen Ambrose. Go to OurAmericanStories.com, and that’s the Transcontinental Railroad from the workers’ point of view. And Ambrose does such a great job of doing that in almost all of his nonfiction. When we continue, more of this remarkable story: the building of the Transcontinental Railroad and the Big Four, here on Our American Stories. And we continue here with Our American Stories, and now let’s continue with the story of the Big Four and the Transcontinental Railroad.

00:19:46
Speaker 2: Crocker assembled his best men and then waited for several days until the railroads were approaching Promontory Summit and were so close together that should the Central Pacific break the track-laying record, the Union would have no opportunity to respond. With newspaper correspondents present and other journalists acting as the official timer, Crocker’s boys swung into action. The first rail was laid, and others followed at the rate of 240 feet of rail every

00:20:18
Speaker 3: one minute and twenty seconds.

00:20:21
Speaker 2: The pace was fantastic, but could the Central Pacific crew maintain it for hours on end? The crew didn’t slacken its pace or stop until a break for lunch. After resting and eating, the crew sprang back into action again at

00:20:39
Speaker 3: the same record-breaking pace.

00:20:41
Speaker 2: At the end of the workday, time was called, and the distance carefully measured. The Central Pacific crew had laid ten miles and

00:20:52
Speaker 3: fifty-six feet of track.

00:20:55
Speaker 2: The Union Pacific record was broken, and Charles Crocker was ten dollars richer. Now, it’s the general impression of most today that the track-laying must have been done by a cast of thousands, and that, since this was the Central Pacific, those laying the track must have been Chinese. Not true on either count. The newspaper reporter who was timing the eve