Transcontinental Railroad | Dancing with a Whirlwind | 2
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Wondery Plus subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Imagine it's August 1863 in New York City. Sweat clings to your Army uniform as you walk into the cool, shadowed interior of a downtown steakhouse. You're a railroad executive and a major general in the Union Army. You've come here today to meet with an old colleague, Thomas Durant.

Durant is a Wall Street speculator and railroad promoter and is always working on some sort of scheme. As your eyes adjust to the dim lighting in the restaurant, you spot Durant waving at you from his table in the corner a bottle of Bordeaux already uncorked and two glasses filled. General, we have much to discuss. Durant slides a wine glass towards you as you take a seat. Good afternoon, Thomas. What are you cooking up this time?

Durant rakes his fingers through his scraggly beard, his sharp eyes boring into you. An opportunity of a lifetime. A chance to invest in the Union Pacific. The company needs 2,000 shares in order to be incorporated, and only then can we begin construction. Oh, I don't know, Thomas. It's been more than a year since Congress chartered the company. From what I've heard, sales of the stock are lagging. Maybe with good reason.

The scale of the project alone is enough to deter any smart investor. Ah, but the bigger the scale, the more money to be made, my friend. The Union Pacific is not just another rail. It promises to connect the nation from coast to coast. The potential is limitless. Thomas, I'm sorry. It's a worthy project, to be sure. But that doesn't mean it's a sound investment. This just isn't a good time, not with the war going on. Well, I have an offer that I think will sway you.

What would you say if I put up the cash for your first 10% payment? The stock will be in your name, but I can personally guarantee that you'll be protected from any loss. I'll even take the stock off your hands if need be. It's a risk-free deal. You take a sip of wine, weighing his words. His offer is generous, but suspiciously so. Well, I admit it's enticing.

Durant grins. About a dozen other men said the same thing. A dozen other men? How many shares have you purchased? I thought the law limited individuals to owning no more than 200. Durant waves his hand impatiently. Let me worry about the details. You know, I think there might be a position on the board for you. We're going to make history together, you and me.

Durant's passion is infectious, and you can't help but feel stirred by his vision. The allure of being part of something so historic is undeniable. All right then, count me in. With a look of satisfaction, Durant signals to a waiter. You take a deep sip of wine. You know you're entering uncharted territory, but Durant has offered you a deal that is simply too good to turn down. And the nation is counting on daring men like you to deliver it.

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From Wondery, I'm Lindsey Graham, and this is American History Tellers. Our history, your story. American History Tellers

In the summer of 1863, an unscrupulous businessman named Thomas Durant gained control of the Union Pacific Railroad, the company chartered by Congress to build the transcontinental railroad westward from the Missouri River. He pressured and enticed friends and acquaintances into purchasing shares by offering to cover their initial payments. By funding most of the stock purchases himself, Durant took charge of the Union Pacific, a

a position he would use to siphon money out of the project and into his own pockets. But while these financial schemes were helping kickstart the Union Pacific, 2,000 miles to the west in California, a shortage of workers delayed progress on the other end of the rail line, the Central Pacific. So soon, the company would turn to an unexpected labor source to tackle its most difficult and dangerous terrain. This is Episode 2, Dancing with a Whirlwind.

In July 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railroad Act, chartering the Union Pacific Railroad and setting up the central piece of the railway that would connect the country coast to coast. The Union Pacific would build a transcontinental railroad westward from the Missouri River, while the Central Pacific would build eastward from Sacramento, California.

The Pacific Railroad Act also appointed a board of 163 commissioners to the Union Pacific, most of them prominent railroad men, bankers, and politicians, tasking them with organizing the company.

In September 1862, the board gathered in Chicago for its first meeting, but fewer than half of the appointed commissioners showed up. For most, the task of building the transcontinental railroad seemed too outlandish to even attempt. But despite the lackluster turnout, the commissioners selected temporary leaders for the company from those in attendance. But when the Union Pacific offered shares to the public a few days later, there were few takers.

That presented a problem because according to the Pacific Railroad Act, the Union Pacific could not be incorporated until it sold 2,000 shares. The company advertised the sale of stock subscriptions in dozens of cities, but after four months, they had sold only a grand total of 45 shares to 11 men.

Nearly half of those shares were bought by one man, Thomas Durant. He was a ruthless, scheming self-promoter who loved money and was willing to lie, cheat, and steal to obtain it. A Massachusetts native who graduated from medical school, he quickly decided he was not cut out for life as a doctor, although he continued to use the nickname Doc. Only a career in business could satisfy his restless energy and insatiable appetite for profit.

So instead of medicine, he set his sights on Wall Street, investing in railroad stocks. In the 1850s, he founded a railroad construction firm and helped manage the construction of the Mississippi and Missouri Railroad.

Now he intended to control the Union Pacific. This new railroad was the biggest government-funded construction project in history, and Durant was not going to miss his chance to profit from it. Though he only had minor success in railroad building, he was never one to shy away from a challenge. An associate would later explain, he had a capacity and mental strength and energy which seemed to grow in proportion to the difficulties that he was compelled to encounter.

So Durant put this capacity to work, and in September 1863, one year after the board had gathered in Chicago, the Union Pacific suddenly sold all 2,000 shares it needed to incorporate. Durant had personally financed most of the sales through strawman buyers. It was an illegal move. The 1862 Act limited individuals to owning no more than 200 shares,

But Durant got what he wanted. When the Stockholers met the following month, in October 1863, the original commissioners stepped down and a new board of directors took their seats. Most of these directors were hand-picked by Durant. His old colleague John Dix was appointed president, and Durant himself became vice president. But Dix was merely a figurehead. He had accepted a major general's commission with the Union Army, and with the Civil War raging, Dix had little time for managing a railroad.

Durant would be the one calling the shots.

But before he could begin work, he still needed to determine the railroad's eastern terminus. The 1862 law stipulated that President Abraham Lincoln would make the final decision. And Lincoln was flooded with petitions from communities on both sides of the Missouri River, each seeking to benefit from the surge in business a railroad terminus would bring. As he considered his options, Lincoln recalled a chance meeting he had in Council Bluffs, Iowa in 1859.

He was introduced to a talented young engineer named Grenville Dodge, and the pair discussed possible routes for the Transcontinental Railroad.

Dodge had been adamant that the railroad should begin in Council Bluffs and travel west along the 42nd parallel across Nebraska's Platte River Valley, a broad, flat expanse stretching 600 miles from the Missouri River to the base of the Rocky Mountains. Dodge considered it the most practical route because of the uniform grade across the valley and because other railroads were already building lines extending from Chicago to Council Bluffs.

Four years after this meeting with Lincoln, Dodge was now serving in the Union Army. He fought in combat and built railroads to transport soldiers and supplies. He refused multiple job offers from both the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific. He was committed to seeing the war through.

But in the spring of 1863, President Lincoln summoned Dodge to the White House to discuss railroads. Dodge reiterated his belief in the Platte River Route and Council Bluffs as the starting point. This suited Lincoln because he owned property in Council Bluffs and he had political favors to repay in Iowa.

But most of Lincoln's time was devoted to leading the nation through war, and he delayed making a final decision. In the meantime, Durant sent surveyors to Omaha, Nebraska, just across the river from Council Bluffs. Durant owned property in Omaha, and starting there would allow the Union Pacific to avoid the cost of constructing a large bridge over the Missouri River.

Then, on November 17, 1863, two days after Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address and three weeks after the Central Pacific spiked its first rails in Sacramento, Lincoln issued an executive order designating Council Bluffs, Iowa as the railroad's eastern terminus.

But the language in the order was vague, something Durant took advantage of to make neighboring Omaha, located across the Missouri River, the real terminus. Lincoln and his staff were too preoccupied with the war to contradict him, so on December 1st, Durant staged a groundbreaking ceremony, complete with music and fireworks, in Omaha. The governor of the Nebraska Territory turned the first shovel of dirt, and soon speculators descended on Omaha to buy up land so they could sell it later at higher prices.

In the meantime, Chief Engineer Peter Day was ready to get to work. He awaited Durant's orders on where the line should proceed from Omaha so that he could begin a survey. But he soon learned the truth about Durant's priorities. Imagine it's January 1864 in Omaha, Nebraska, and you're the new chief engineer for the Union Pacific Railroad. The wind is howling outside your makeshift office, and you're hunched over a cluttered desk making corrections to survey calculations.

The door creaks open. The gust of wind sends your notes scattering to the floor. You crouch down to retrieve them, and as you stand, you see Thomas Durant in the doorway. It's cold enough to freeze the tail off a brass monkey. Durant strolls in, hands in pockets. You stack the papers back on your desk, trying to keep your composure. Hello, Doc. Have you had the chance to approve my suggested line out of Omaha? No.

A smirk tugged at the corner of Durant's mouth. "'I've got a better idea. I want you to survey a new route, starting from DeSoto.' You frowned, glancing down at your map of Nebraska. "'DeSoto? It's twenty miles north of Omaha.' "'It sure is. But when can you get it done?' "'Excuse me, but am I missing something?' The terminus had been decided.'

Logic, geography, even President Lincoln himself have all dictated that the route run from the Missouri River near Omaha to the Platte River and then west along the Platte Valley. Durant just shrugs. But I'm the one who hired you, and I want you to survey from DeSoto. Well, can you tell me why? I mean, you must have a good reason.

Durant leans on your desk, a gleam of mischief in his eyes. Well, I bought land there. So this is about your personal investments? Durant chuckles, clearly enjoying your surprise. Once you survey that line, you can start surveys out of Bellevue and Florence too. I've got all these towns competing against each other to give us depots, rails, and water storage, whatever we want. I think it's pretty smart. And don't you worry, I'm still negotiating with Omaha.

Your work here won't go to waste. But do you even care about getting this railroad built? Doing all these surveys will waste precious time. We need to be grading the land if we're ever going to start laying tracks. Oh, we'll build the railroad. But we can have a little fun doing it, can't we?

With a wink, Durant turns around and saunters toward the door. You stare after him in disbelief. You don't understand how a man like Durant can be trusted to lead this company. Seems to you that with Durant in charge, this railroad will never get built. Durant's chief engineer, Peter Day, was busy laying out the precise route for the railroad when Durant started throwing out new possibilities for a terminus. In addition to Omaha, Durant had three nearby towns competing against each other.

Day was furious. In early 1864, he wrote to his old friend and advisor to President Lincoln, Grenville Dodge, complaining, If the geography was a little larger, I think Durant would order a survey round by the moon and a few of the fixed stars to see if he could not get some more depot grounds. He declared Durant utterly unfit to head such an enterprise, explaining, It's like dancing with a whirlwind to have anything to do with him.

But Durant's faults as a manager were not the Union Pacific's biggest challenges. Construction would require enormous amounts of cash, but few investors were willing to risk their fortunes on such a big gamble. Durant knew that he needed to find a way to guarantee short-term dividends to potential investors. So like the Big Four at the Central Pacific, he decided to milk profit from construction.

In March 1864, Durant founded a sham construction company called Credit Mobilier of America. The Union Pacific would hire Credit Mobilier to build the railroad at inflated prices. Credit Mobilier would subcontract the work to real crews at a much lower cost and pocket the difference. The profits would go to Durant and other insiders.

Essentially, Durant and his friends planned to use government funds to enrich themselves. And with Credit Mobilier, Durant knew it didn't matter if the railroad was ever completed. He would make all his profits from just trying to build it.

Durant also went to work in Washington, handing out cash and stocks to legislators in support of a revised railroad bill. Central Pacific Vice President Collis Huntington also aggressively lobbied Congress. And the two men's efforts paid off in July when Lincoln signed the 1864 Pacific Railway Act into law.

This new law increased the amount of land and bonds awarded to the two railroad companies, and it sped up the process of releasing the bonds. Now, government bonds would be distributed for every 20 miles of track completed instead of the previous 40 miles. It also granted the companies all coal and mineral rights on granted lands.

But despite this good news, Durant continued devising creative ways to extract profit from the railroad. He decided to exploit the fact that the government was paying the railroad companies by the mile. And for help with this scheme, he enlisted Colonel Silas Seymour as consulting engineer.

Late in 1864, Durant ordered Seymour to revise Peter Day's survey to have the railroad line detour to the south of Omaha in the shape of an oxbow. This would add nine miles to the proposed route, which meant more government money and land and more profits to credit mobilier. Engineer Peter Day was outraged.

But way back in Washington, officials maintained a rosy outlook. On December 6, 1864, President Lincoln gave a triumphant speech to Congress about the progress in the Union's war effort and that the Transcontinental Railroad had been entered upon with a vigor that gives assurance of success.

The next day, though, Peter Day resigned in protest of Durant's meddling and scheming. Despite Lincoln's celebratory remarks, the railroad's success was by no means guaranteed. And more than two years after Congress first chartered the railroad, the Union Pacific had yet to spike a single rail. Things weren't better in California, where the Central Pacific still had to overcome the snow-capped peaks of the Sierra Nevada.

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On October 26, 1863, workers laid the first rails of the Central Pacific Railroad in Sacramento, California. There was no ceremony or fanfare. Central Pacific Vice President Collis Huntington warned his associates about the tough road ahead. He wrote, If you want to jubilate over driving the first spike, go ahead and do it. I don't.

Those mountains over there look too ugly. Anybody can drive the first bike, but there are many months of labor and unrest between the first and last bike. And he was right. But in the beginning, the crews had the advantage of starting their work on flat terrain. Within two weeks, enough track had been laid for the Central Pacific to make its first run. A locomotive named the Governor Stanford traveled half a mile from downtown Sacramento to the end of the tracks.

And as the path of the train progressed east of Sacramento, an army of crews cut through the California wilderness. Chief Engineer Samuel Montague led a small team of surveyors to map out the future tracks, marking the exact route the railroad would follow to the California-Nevada state line.

Behind Montague and his team of surveyors came the graders, tasked with leveling the land to prepare the railroad's path. These grading crews performed the most physically demanding work of all. They were forced to stoop low to dig through the earth and rocks with shovels and pickaxes. For hours on end, they heaved dirt onto embankments and loaded and unloaded carts of gravel.

Then, after the graders, came the track layers. One crew lined up wooden ties along the grade. Another crew dropped the heavy iron rails into place, making sure they were spread exactly four feet, eight and a half inches apart. Others wielded sledgehammers to spike the rails to the ties. Each spike received three blows of an 18-pound sledgehammer.

Most of these workers were Irish immigrants who had recently arrived in America. Construction chief Charles Crocker hired them through agents in Boston and New York and shipped them west. But finding laborers was a constant struggle. California had a small population, and most men preferred to work closer to the comfort of towns or out in the gold mines.

But despite the shortage of labor, by February 1864, the Central Pacific track layers had laid 16 miles of track. But that same month, the graders encountered their first major hurdle at the Bloomer Divide, roughly 30 miles northeast of Sacramento. Bloomer Divide was a 63-foot-high, 800-foot-long stretch of naturally cemented gravel that needed to be cleared out one wheelbarrow at a time.

Workers used up to 500 kegs of black powder a day, loosening up the gravel to create the so-called bloomer cut, a pathway through the divide. This process would take months.

In the meantime, the track layers kept pushing east, and the railroad began regular freight and passenger services between Sacramento and the end of the track in the Sierra foothills. But despite this new revenue stream, the Central Pacific was broke. For the rest of 1864, the company would scrape by using seed capital from the Big Four as well as loans from wealthy businessmen.

But good news arrived in July 1864 when the Big Four learned that Congress had updated the Pacific Railway Act. Now, the Central Pacific could collect government bonds every 20 miles of approved track. Unfortunately, the government was slow in distributing these bonds, and by the end of 1864, the company had yet to receive a penny in government aid. Crocker complained, If we only had the government bonds in hand, that would help our credit amazingly.

And Crocker knew that costs would only grow as his workers moved closer to the imposing granite walls of the Sierra Nevada.

And by the start of 1865, his workforce only numbered 600 men, not nearly enough to tackle the Sierras. So on January 7th, Crocker placed an advertisement in the Sacramento Union for an additional 5,000 workers. Many joined, but few stayed. Men often signed up with a railroad to gain transportation to the end of the line before running off into the goldfields.

The workers who did stick it out were managed by Crocker's newly hired crew boss, James Harvey Strobridge. Strobridge was a foul-mouthed, hot-tempered Irish immigrant. He stood six foot tall and wore a black eye patch after losing his eye in a powder accident at Bloomer Cut. According to Crocker, Strobridge declared, "...you cannot talk to the workers as though you were talking to gentlemen, because they are not gentlemen. They are about as near brutes as they can get."

So heaping verbal abuse on his workers, Strobridge extracted as much labor as he could from his meager crews. But Crocker feared it wasn't enough. He knew that if the Central Pacific was ever going to cross the Sierras, more than anything, he needed men. Imagine it's late January 1865, and you're the construction chief of the Central Pacific Railroad. You're walking through the Bloomer Cut worksite in Newcastle, California, with your crew boss, James Harvey Strobridge.

Well, you know, we've got enough work to employ 4,000 men.

We only have 800 on payroll. We're falling behind, James. Strobridge grunts, his expression as stony as ever. We'll make up for it once we're done with this cut. Well, I'm not sure we will, but I do have an idea. I've been thinking about hiring these Chinese workers.

Strowbridge's head snaps towards you. Not a chance in hell. I won't be responsible for work done by Chinamen. They're strange, unsavory people. I don't like the idea of it either, but what choice do we have? Where else are we going to find thousands of men desperate for work? Strowbridge crosses his arms, his lone eye narrowing. The Chinese don't have the strength or the skills needed to build a railroad. It's damn hard work, and they're not cut out for it. The foreman blows a whistle, signaling the end of the workday.

The workers all drop their tools and trudge back to camp. You gesture toward them. Now, I know they're your countrymen, but be reasonable. The Irish have not exactly proven themselves to be reliable. Half of these men are off to gamble their wages away right now. The other half are just going to get drunk and clear out. We need men we can count on.

Strobridge shrugs. "'They just need more discipline, and I'm working on it.' "'Well, what better way to keep the Irish in line but to show them how easily they can be replaced? You honestly think Chinese men are hardy enough? The Chinese built the Great Wall, didn't they? All I'm asking for is a trial. We hire fifty men to shovel dirt and rocks, and if they can't hack it, we'll move on.' Strobridge clenches his jaw, mulling it all over. Finally, he exhales slowly.

50 men. That's it. And don't expect me to coddle them. If they can't do the work, they're gone. Fair enough. You clap Strobridge on the back, but there's a tightness in your chest. You're desperate for this experiment to work. Failure is not an option. Because unless you hire more men soon, you know you'll never get across the Sierras.

In 1865, there were roughly 60,000 Chinese immigrants in California. Most had come during the gold rush, hoping to make money to support their families back in China. Many ended up as cooks, laundrymen, and gardeners, earning as little as $3 a week. They faced rampant discrimination and violence, and this anti-Chinese sentiment extended to the Central Pacific. Strobridge insisted that Chinese men were not physically strong enough for railroad construction.

But in January 1865, Crocker persuaded him to hire 50 Chinese workers on a trial basis. These initial 50 workers quickly proved Strobridge wrong. They were hardworking and conscientious. They did not complain. They worked in teams, and they took almost no breaks. They only drank boiled tea, which kept them healthier than the white workers, who often drank water from polluted ditches, a habit that made them prone to dysentery and other waterborne illnesses.

So soon, Strobridge hired more local Chinese men, paying them $26 a month to work 12 hours a day, six days a week. This was $4 less than what white workers made, and they had to pay for their own tents and food. So each gang of Chinese workers had a cook who sourced a wide variety of ingredients from San Francisco and Sacramento. And at night, the aromas of garlic, peanut oil, cuttlefish, and seaweed wafted through the campsites.

The Chinese workers' diet baffled the Irish, who ate mostly boiled beef, potatoes, and beans. But Crocker was thrilled with the Chinese workers' diligence and clean living, so much so that he hired a labor agent in San Francisco to find more men and even recruit them out of China if necessary. By the end of 1865, the Central Pacific would employ 7,000 Chinese workers and roughly 2,000 white workers.

These men would tackle some of the biggest challenges of the entire transcontinental railroad. This included grading the Bloomer Cut, a task finally completed in the spring of 1865. Around that same time, Collis Huntington finally received $1.25 million in government bonds for work completed the previous year. He used this money to pay off loans required to keep the work going.

And then, toward the end of the summer, 1865, track layers reached the town of Colfax, 54 miles east of Sacramento. But the distance from Colfax to the Donner Summit was another 50 miles, over the course of which the grade would climb nearly 5,000 feet.

And only three miles east of Colfax was one of the most daunting stretches of the entire route, a sheer granite cliff rising more than 1,400 feet above the American River, nicknamed Cape Horn, after the rugged tip of South America. The workers needed to carve a ledge along the side of the mountain where the track would run.

and Chinese workers came up with the idea of weaving reeds into baskets. A man would climb into one of these baskets, and his fellow workers would lower him down. While dangling in the air by ropes, the man in the basket would use a hand drill to bore a small hole into the face of the cliff. Then he would insert black powder into the hole, light a fuse, and pray his fellow workers lifted him up fast enough to avoid the blast.

The work was extremely dangerous, and an unknown number of men lost their lives. But clearing the roadbed in the area around Cape Horn was even more perilous. This area was home to some of the tallest trees in the world, which soared hundreds of feet in the air.

A single gang of 300 men spent 10 days clearing just one mile. Meanwhile, the lumber was shipped to sawmills to be made into ties for the track. The workers then had to blast the stumps from the soil, and with each explosion, chunks of rock and timber flew through the air, raining down on the crews. In any given week, the men used as much blasting powder as the armies at Antietam did on the bloodiest day of the Civil War.

But Cape Horm was not the only obstacle the Central Pacific crews faced. The challenges mounted in the fall of 1865, as the Chinese crews began blasting tunnels. Fifteen tunnels needed to be bored through solid grant, a task without precedent anywhere in the world. This would be the most difficult and dangerous work of the entire transcontinental railroad, and it was agonizingly slow.

Even with men working in shifts around the clock, they averaged between 6 and 12 inches every 24 hours. The cost of the blasting powder strained the Central Pacific's scant resources, too. But at the end of the year, the railroad leaders known as the Big Four received the welcome news that the federal government had approved the track from Mile 31 to Mile 54, from Newcastle to Colfax. This amounted to $1.1 million in government bonds.

but it was still not enough to cover their spending. In 1865 alone, construction had cost $6 million.

The Central Pacific was desperately short on cash, and it had only just begun to penetrate some of the hardest rock in North America. But he was not alone in facing seemingly insurmountable challenges. Out in the Great Plains, the Union Pacific confronted a tangled web of logistical and financial problems, plus resistance from the native communities who lived in the path of the railroad's tracks.

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Unlike the Central Pacific, the Union Pacific had no mountains or towering trees to overcome in the Nebraska prairies. Instead, the men who ran the Union Pacific considered their greatest obstacle to be the thousands of Plains Indians living in the path of the advancing railroad.

By 1865, the Cheyenne, Sioux, and Arapaho tribes had endured brutal treatment from the U.S. Army. In November 1864, the Army attacked a Cheyenne village at Sand Creek, Colorado, massacring 150 Cheyenne, most of them unarmed women and children.

Two months later, in early January 1865, 1,000 Cheyenne, Sioux, and Arapaho warriors retaliated by descending on the tiny white settlement of Julesburg, Colorado. There, they killed civilians as well as U.S. Army soldiers from nearby Fort Sedgwick. Afterward, they tore down miles of telegraph wire and burned Julesburg to the ground.

Army leaders responded to this escalation by sending General Grenville Dodge to the Great Plains to lead campaigns against Indian war parties. But he was also ordered to clear the way for the Union Pacific Railroad. Dodge instructed his commanders to remove all Indians from the railroad lands, using force if necessary.

While battling Indians in the Plains, Dodge also fielded a stream of telegrams from his former colleague, Union Pacific Vice President Thomas Durant. Durant offered Dodge the job of chief engineer in the wake of Peter Day's resignation, but Dodge refused to join the railroad until he was satisfied that he had subdued the Indians in its path.

Meanwhile, the Union Pacific was short on cash. Even President Abraham Lincoln worried that the Union Pacific would collapse under the weight of its financial problems. So in January 1865, Lincoln summoned Massachusetts Congressman Oaks Ames into his office. Ames was known as the King of Spades, having made his fortune in the shovel business. Lincoln told Ames, The road must be built, and you're the man to do it.

Take hold of it yourself. By building the Union Pacific, you will be the remembered man of your generation. So with Lincoln's encouragement, Ames poured his energy and money into the Union Pacific over the next several months. He and his brother Oliver bought $1 million worth of Credit Mobilier stock, and he loaned the Union Pacific $600,000 so its crews could start laying track. Ames also began persuading his friends to buy Credit Mobilier stock at insider prices.

Yet even with this infusion of funds, Thomas Durant faced manpower and material shortages. With thousands of young men fighting in the Union and Confederate armies, Durant struggled to find enough workers to build the railroad. Hardwood for ties needed to be shipped 175 miles up the Missouri River, too, and it was only navigable by steamboat for three to four months a year.

So to save money and time, Durant ordered his contractors to use the Nebraska cottonwood for ties, even though it was far less durable. But in all this time, the Union Pacific still had not laid a single track. It wasn't until July 10, 1865, that the Union Pacific finally spiked its first rails in Omaha, three months after the Civil War came to an end and the railroad lost a great champion with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

By the time winter set in that year and the workers laid down their tools, they had managed to lay just 40 miles of track, what one reporter described as two streaks of rust across the Nebraska prairie. Still, it was enough for the company to collect $640,000 in government bonds.

But 40 miles was far short of Durant's goal. The 1864 Pacific Railroad Act required the company to complete the first 100 miles of track by the end of June 1866. So by the start of that year, Durant resolved to overhaul his organization. To speed up construction, Durant put brothers Jack and Dan Casement in charge of track laying. Because before the war, crews under the brothers' leadership had once laid three miles of track in a single day.

The casements were tough bosses who demanded total obedience from their crew. Jack had served as a Union Army officer in the Civil War, and his workers called him General Jack. But there was one man Durant was still determined to hire, someone he believed could finally turn the tide in his favor. Imagine it's April 1866, and you're standing on the platform of the train station in St. Joseph, Missouri. The smell of burning coal fills the air as a train rolls in from the east.

For more than a year, you've been battling Indian warriors out in the Great Plains. But you've traveled here today to meet with Union Pacific Vice President Thomas Durant before you head back to your headquarters in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Durant steps down from the train carriage and walks towards you with a wide grin. General, it's good to see you again.

Passengers weave their way around you as you shake Durant's hand and nod curtly, already steeling yourself for the question you know is coming. Oh, hello, Doc. Well, you know as well as I do why I ask you to meet. It's time for you to leave the Army and come join me at Union Pacific as our chief engineer. We need a man of your talents, your expertise. Well, we've been over this. I have a duty to perform. Durant raises an eyebrow. The war's been over for a year, my friend.

What use are you to your country stuck in some post in the middle of nowhere? If you join the Union Pacific, you could help build the future, help unite the nation from coast to coast. All while fighting off hostile tribes and managing a workforce that spans miles. Building railroads is a troublesome business, Doc. The Union Pacific's building the most troublesome railroad of all. Durant leans in. Oh, I never thought of you as a man to shrink from a challenge. Tell me, what will it take to get you on board?

I'm prepared to offer you a handsome salary, better than anything you could get in the army. You hesitate, considering the question carefully. Well, I would need absolute control over the railroad. There's one thing that the army has taught me. It's that battles are never won when there's a divided command. Well, of course, you'd be chief engineer after all. No, I mean it, Doc. I won't allow any interference from you or your associates in New York. Durant throws up his hands. I'll give you full control. You have my word.

You study his expression, trying to gauge the sincerity behind his words. You know full well what a meddler Durant is, especially when money is involved, and already his eyes gleam with excitement. You say full control. Full control? And how does $10,000 a year sound? Plus stock and credit mobilier. You'd be a rich man in no time. The offer is tempting, more than enough to make up for the inevitable headaches that will come with a job.

You extend your hand slowly. Well, I'll speak with General Sherman about resigning my command. Durant grasps your hand with a firm shake. Oh, you won't regret this. But as you watch Durant walk away, disappearing into the stream of passengers on the platform, you know you're taking a big risk by trusting him. Still, you're not one to shrink from battle, and Durant is right. The Union Pacific is waging the biggest battle of them all.

In April 1866, Durant finally convinced Grenville Dodge to come aboard as chief engineer for the Union Pacific. Durant knew that Dodge was a brilliant engineer, a talented lobbyist, and an experienced commander of men. He was also well-connected as a close confidant of the nation's top military leaders, Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman. So when he requested a leave of absence from the Army, Dodge received it.

And he wasn't the only veteran joining the Union Pacific. One year after the end of the Civil War, there were thousands of young men looking for work, and veterans flocked to the railroad. Dodge soon reorganized the workforce along military lines. He later reflected that the railroad would never have been built without lessons learned from the war on how to think big and organize men.

And he relied on his track-laying chiefs, Jack and Dan Casement, to keep his workers in line. Managing men was a specialty of the Casement brothers, who oversaw 3,000 workers by the spring of 1866. And once the Missouri River became navigable again in April, supplies started pouring into Omaha, and the crews went back to work. Soon the men were laying up to three miles of track a day. And by late July, the railroad extended 150 miles past Omaha.

Their work was a spectacular sight. One reporter observed, Sherman, with his victorious legion sweeping from Atlanta to Savannah, was a spectacle less glorious than this army of men marching on foot from Omaha to Sacramento. At the end of 1866, the Union Pacific Line extended more than 300 miles out of Omaha, and the Central Pacific were grinding through granite in the Sierra Nevadas.

But both railroads were in for a harsher winter than they could ever imagine. Snowstorms and freezing temperatures threatened to bring construction to a complete standstill, just as the two railroads entered into a fierce competition for miles, money, and prestige. From Wondery, this is Episode 2 of our four-part series, Transcontinental Railroad from American History Tellers.

On the next episode, Congress sets up a race between the two railroad companies. Snowstorms blanket the Sierras, while Central Pacific crews blast a tunnel through the Donner Summit. And in Wyoming, Cheyenne warriors derail trains and attack Union Pacific workers.

If you like American History Tellers, you can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. And before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.

American History Tellers is hosted, edited, and produced by me, Lindsey Graham for Airship. Audio editing by Christian Paraga. Sound design by Molly Bach. Music by Lindsey Graham. This episode is written by Ellie Stanton. Edited by Dorian Marina. Produced by Alida Rosansky. Managing producers Desi Blaylock and Matt Gant. Senior managing producer Ryan Lohr. Senior producer Annie Herman. Executive producers are Jenny Lauer Beckman, Marshall Louis, and Erin O'Flaherty for Wondery.

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