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America's first transcontinental railroad (known originally as the "Pacific Railroad" and later as the "Overland Route") was a 1,911-mile (3,075 km) 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. [1]
The United States' first transcontinental railroad was 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. Its construction was considered to be one of the greatest American technological feats of the 19th century.
The Bear River Bridge on the Nevada County Narrow-Gauge Railroad, which was the highest railroad bridge in the state. Some of the railroad’s rolling stock is preserved at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad & Transportation Museum in Nevada City, California. Photo courtesy of the Searls Historical Library collection, Nevada City, California.
Ceremony for the completion of the First Transcontinental Railroad, May 1869, at Promontory Summit, U.T. The Southern states had blocked westward rail expansion before 1860, but after secession the Pacific Railway Acts were passed in 1862 [54] and 1863, which respectively established the central Pacific route and the standard gauge to be used.
Theodore Judah was born in 1826 (perhaps 1825 [1]) in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Mary (Reece) and The Rev. Henry Raymond Judah, an Episcopal clergyman. [2] After his family moved to Troy, New York, Judah attended the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, then called the Rensselaer Institute in 1837 for a term [3] and developed at a young age a passion for engineering and railroads.
The quarry man's 'make-do' railroad solution was the continent's first chartered railway, first operational non-temporary railway, first well documented railroad, and first constructed railroad also meant to be permanent. It was perhaps the only railroad replaced by a canal, and also one of the first to close, and of those, perhaps is alone in ...
Construction of the road was financed primarily by 30-year, 6% U.S. government bonds authorized by Sec. 5 of the Pacific Railroad Act of 1862.They were issued at the rate of $16,000 ($265,000 in 2017 dollars) per mile of tracked grade completed east of the designated base of the Sierra Nevada range near Roseville, CA where California state geologist Josiah Whitney had determined were the ...
It was originally the "Union Pacific, Eastern Division", although it was completely independent. The Pennsylvania Railroad, working with Missouri financiers, designed it as a feeder line to the transcontinental system. The owners lobbied heavily in Washington for money to build a railroad from Kansas City to Colorado, and then to California.