Trips across country that once took months, now took days passing through terrain that was unreachable by most people except now through daring engineering ingenuity. The nation was forever united from the east coast to the west coast. Once completed, the Transcontinental Railroad revealed a modern engineering marvel. The tracks often crossed lands of American Indians growing increasingly concerned of the continuing influx of settlers. Building the cross-continent railways was a grueling, arduous task for thousands of workers who came from many different backgrounds, including formerly-enslaved African Americans and immigrants from Asia and Europe hoping to build a new life. Golden Spike National Historical Park in northern Utah tells the complex story of how the Transcontinental Railroad united the nation in many ways, ultimately changing life for every person on the continent. At 12:47 pm, a telegraph flashed across the country: D-O-N-E.
A crowd gathered on May 10, 1869, to witness the driving of a ceremonial golden spike connecting the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroad lines to complete the Transcontinental Railroad. One hundred and fifty years ago, the nation was joined at the rails at Promontory Summit in present-day Utah. Thousands of people gathered around the park for the 150th anniversary of the driving of the golden spike on May 10, 2019.
