The Transcontinental Railroad had a profound effect on the way of life experienced by the average American. Almost single-handedly, the railroad pulled the country puffing and steaming into the 20th century, from a world of colonialism and rugged western expansion into the modern age of urban sprawl and the concrete jungle. Regardless of whether they traveled on it, the railroad halted the life of the cowboy, decreased the living spaces for those living the life of the American Indian, and increased the availability of a ‘normal’ lifestyle even in the vast expanses of the western prairies. Goods could be shipped across long distances at a fraction of the cost and messages could be sent across the country in a fraction of the time. The purpose of the present research is to discover how the advent of the railroad affected the daily lives of Americans, particularly in the American West.
While the general impression has always been that the railroads did little more than destroy those who came to work on them, this investigation attempts to prove that for all the harm it caused, the railroad also created many new opportunities for minority groups seeking new beginnings in the modern world. The railroad introduced significant changes to the previously wild and unknown western portions of the country. While there were already many individuals living out in the empty prairies, it remained a difficult and precarious lifestyle, frequently isolating individuals from families back east thanks to a slow and costly communications system and the difficulties and distances to be traveled. For this reason, a change occurred relatively slowly within the western half of the nation except in those areas more easily accessible by boat. As the railroads were built, however, change was forced upon the land. Industries changed as the landscape was divided up into manageable parcels, economies shifted as efficiency replaced older traditional methods of business and people’s lifestyles were changed significantly as a result.
Before the railroad came through, the country was largely divided by the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers, both of which were considered impassable barriers. Therefore, the west was considered to states such as Michigan and Illinois, who sent their produce typically by boat to get around the Appalachians via the Mississippi through New Orleans and on to the eastern market (Taylor, 1956, 56). This was a circuitous route that divided the continent into three parts – the east, the west, and the far west only accessible only boat or the dangerous overland wagon route commonly beset by Indians, bad weather, treacherous terrain, and threats of illness or starvation. In describing the various ways in which Americans could travel from the eastern portion of the continent to the western coastal cities, Williams (1988) illustrates the various dangers of the Panama crossing, the long route around Cape Horn, and some of the more imaginative but equally risky routes attempted through places such as Nicaragua (6-8). These extreme attempts to circumnavigate the central portion of the continent begin to suggest the severity of the terrain.
Across this frightening wasteland rode the Plains Indians, themselves worthy adversaries described as “the finest light cavalry in the world” (Williams, 1988, 10) and the uncontrollable force of the wild buffalo, whose herds could reach lengths as great as 25 miles of track trampling, civilization busting disaster on the move (Bakeless, 1961, 368). To preserve the tracks, the bison would have to go, which would mean the end of the Indians as well and would be sure to instigate their resistance to the concept of a transatlantic railroad. Also, despite the bleak outlook regarding the landscape for more cultured Americans, numerous individuals had already moved west, settling some of these areas in the form of small towns or large cattle ranches that would breed the livestock needed to feed those living in the increasingly crowded east. Outcasts of ‘civilized’ society, such as Nat Love, a black American fleeing the oppression of the only recently freed southern states, became cowboys, carefully driving herds of cattle overland from the sprawling ranches of this wasteland into the markets of the east.
As a result of the changes brought to the wild-west through the ‘civilizing influence of the railroad, significant changes in the way in which people lived their lives were made. The economy of the white man changed as goods and products of the west became more available in the east and commodities or luxuries of the east were made more available in the west. The wild west of the cowboys and criminals was relatively quickly replaced by law and order brought to these remote locations through the convenience, speed, and relative safety of rail transportation even as entire populations of peoples who had lived in the area for generations were either forcefully relocated or killed off through starvation or war. As the countryside was tamed and made safe for new settlers, wives and children joined the migration, carving out large segments of the country in the name of civilization and the American Dream.
With the expansion of settlers to the west, spreading out across the great wasteland of the interior, the lifestyles and native economies of the continent’s indigenous people were profoundly changed. Recognizing the threat for what it was, the Indians remained a threat throughout the pre-railroad years and into the building of the lines as they protested against the invasion of the white people on or across lands they considered theirs. “Along the Arkansas River, bands of Southern Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowa, Comanche and Apache had come to life in the spring, moving furiously against stagecoach lines and scattered settlements, killing many whites” (Bain, 1999, 227). This tug-of-war between the Indians and the settlers came to a head when Colonel Connor led an army of Californians into a Shoshoni camp on Bear River in the winter of 1863. “The ensuing rout quickly turned into a massacre, with warriors, women and children shot down indiscriminately; the survivors tortured and butchered, and female captives brutally raped” (Bain, 1999, 229). This effectively subdued the Shoshoni resistance to the Central Pacific as it was worked through western Utah and Nevada and highlights how the railroads changed the course of life for thousands of Native Americans who had experienced no previous reasons to change centuries-old customs.
This type of behavior occurred all across the continent, consistently ending with the brutal slaying of thousands of Indians by white men finally fed up with whatever losses they had incurred as a result of trespassing on Indian lands. Either the Indians were killed off under the overwhelming onslaught of better-armed men who appeared in greater numbers or they were forced to accept new treaties and ever-changing restrictions on their lifestyles. The Native Americans could no longer survive on their old economy; they either adopted the white man’s ways or faded into non-existence on consistently shrinking reservations. With reports of rough and rowdy towns full of gamblers and prostitutes and the knowledge of how the railroad had begun to erode some of the previous forms of transportation, diverting traffic and commerce in the process, it is unsurprising that the railroads have commonly been considered a negative influence on the lives of many of those associated with it.
As has already been discussed, the lives of the Native American Plains Indians were all but destroyed by the encroachment of the railroad upon their lands and the perceived necessity of killing off the vast herds of buffalo upon which they depended for their livelihood. Numerous individuals who had found a means of making the American Desert their home were forced to find a new means of existing in the booming new economy the railroads brought while many more brought in specifically to help build the railroad found life on the rails was not quite the new opportunity to obtain the quintessential American Dream they had thought or been led to believe. The Indians weren’t the only individuals to be displaced by the encroaching iron horse. Cowboys, several of whom were black seeking their fortunes in a country free of the stigma of slavery, also lost their positions as cowhands riding the open range as cattle ranchers found it necessary to carve the open spaces into individual ranches as a means of keeping their cattle safe from the deadly iron rails. (Gordon, 1996, 155).
Like the indentured servants of the European nations that had arrived more than a century earlier, the young men of China flocked to the call for workers along America’s great railroad, envisioning a world in which a man could make his way and have plenty of space in which to raise a family. According to Williams (1988), by 1865 there were already nearly 50,000 Chinese immigrants living in California, most working in servant capacities such as cooks and launderers, but several operating as merchants and miners. Robert West Howard (1962) indicates that the Chinese were treated nearly as badly as the Indians within the cities and towns of California. They were prevented from entering numerous professions, could not testify in court, were denied citizenship status, and, by 1858, banned by the California legislature from entering the state. The development of such places as San Francisco’s famous Chinatown was the result of such community-wide ostracism, in which many Chinese immigrants could find support and employment only through serving their race or taking highly subservient and ultimately powerless positions in the white world. While the restriction on immigration was reportedly only very poorly enforced, the fact that it was enacted at all demonstrates the low esteem the Chinese had attained by this point in history. Despite this, by the end of 1865, more than 7,000 Chinese workers were employed in the Central Pacific, perhaps as a last resort to supporting themselves.
A great deal of understanding regarding the building of the railroads commonly holds that the Irish immigrants working the rails were treated slightly better than the Chinese, but were still the victims of atrocious working conditions that led to high mortality rates and deep suffering. The work consisted of “bending, digging, shoveling, throwing the dirt up on the embankment, bringing in the ballast by the cartload and dumping it … This was work fit to break a man’s back, and they did it for $3 or so per day, plus board” (Ambrose, 2000, 118). Most of the Irishmen hired to work in the Central Pacific were newly arrived immigrants hired in New York or Boston and shipped to the west. (Ambrose, 2000, 119).
As can be seen, by the results of those Chinese and Irish workers who survived, the railroad provided numerous immigrants with the means they required to support themselves. Severely restricted within the cities of the East (for the Irish) and the West (for the Chinese), the building of the railroad provided both minority groups with jobs, shelter, and a dubious future. However, even a dubious future, one likely to be cut short through accident or violence on the lines, was better than the certainty of no future within the city slums and thousands volunteered to be a part of the great adventure. As others followed to experience the adventure for themselves and make their fortunes off the hard work of others, the interior became more settled, providing even more opportunity for minorities, including women, to find respectable means of making a living in the newly opened lands. Was the railroad overall considered a positive or negative force for change in the old west? In large part, it seems to have depended entirely upon one’s perspective and livelihood before the advent of the railroads or integration into this new industry.
As the railroad plowed its way through the wastelands of America’s interior, it provided the necessary jobs and money to keep the influx of Chinese and Irish immigrants from overwhelming the resources of the cities and towns of the coastlands. Meeting with little more than hostility within these cities, the Irish and the Chinese were not only able to find new lives for themselves but to open up new areas of the country for their fellow Americans to expand and settle. Adventuresome boys and girls were able to experience life as they wished in this new land as the west was tamed, allowing women to expand into respectable fields such as clerical work in the railroad offices and, on the rare occasion, even such distinguished professions as medicine. The construction of the railroad finally connected the country from ‘sea to shining sea’ and enabled the free flow of goods and communication that would eventually transform the country and, by extension, the world.
While there were numerous positive elements to the advance of the railroad and the linking of the east with the west, it is undeniable that there were also numerous, devastating losses. One of the greatest of these was the loss of the land rights of the Plains Indians. Few believe the lifestyles of the Plains Indians would have remained possible regardless of who was pushing the expansion of the railroad as the land became increasingly constrained; however, its loss remains one of history’s great tragedies. Immigrants suffered torturous work conditions and expectations while living in perilous terrain whether they were in the company of a town-full of followers or alone in the emptiness of the American Desert. Vindictive Indians, fighting to retain as much of their freedom and lands as possible, remained as much of a threat as their fellow railroad workers.
The carving up of the Great American Desert by the introduction of the first Transatlantic Railroad introduced both positive and negative changes to the lives of the average individual. For the Indians, there were almost no positives to be found as they lost their lands, their respect, their livelihoods, and their ancestral cultures in the face of the marauding bands of railroad workers, army battalions and armed settlers brought in the wake of the great steam engine. This same carving up of the land made it possible for the country to grow, though, providing the space necessary for the United States to absorb the massive influx of people fleeing repressive practices in their own countries, such as the Chinese, or seeking a means of making a better life for themselves and their families, such as the Irish. Because these immigrants arrived in such large numbers, they quickly gained the contempt and disrespect of those who had either been born in America or were otherwise of the ‘ruling’ class and skin color. However, the railroad provided them both with a means of supporting themselves and establishing the new life they sought, if they could survive the experience and applied their knowledge well, such as saving their money rather than gambling it away in the camps that followed them. The railroad also provided the avenue through which the Chinese immigrants, mysterious to the Americans thanks to a language barrier, could prove themselves worthy of respect and through which women were able to discover new freedoms and independence within respectable realms.
Works Cited
Ambrose, Stephen E. “Nothing Like it in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869.” New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000.
Bain, David Haward. “Empire Express: Building the First Transcontinental Railroad.” New York: Viking, 1999.
Bakeless, John. “The Eyes of Discovery: America as Seen by the First Explorers.” New York: Dover Publications, 1961.
Gordon, Sarah H. “Passage to Union: How the Railroads Transformed American Life, 1829-1929.” Chicago, IL: Ivan R. Dee, 1996.
Howard, Robert West. “The Great Iron Trail: The Story of the First Transcontinental Railroad.” New York: Bonanza Books, 1962.
Taylor, George. “The American Railroad Network: 1861-1890.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1956.
Williams, John Hoyt. “A Great and Shining Road: The Epic Story of the Transcontinental Railroad.” New York: Times Books (Random House), 1988.