The Chinese Immigrants Who Built America
HISTORY This Week
The HISTORY® Channel | Back Pocket Studios
4.5 • 4.2K Ratings
🗓️ 10 May 2021
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
May 10, 1869. On the dusty, barren plains of Promontory Summit, Utah, a crowd is gathered to celebrate an American milestone – the completion of the transcontinental railroad, the first piece of infrastructure to connect the two sides of the United States. But this achievement didn’t come without great sacrifice, especially from Chinese immigrants, who made up more than 90% of the Central Pacific Railroad company workforce. How did these workers come to build what might be the most important transportation project in US history? And how were these Chinese immigrants accepted by American society, before the tides turned to violence and hate?
Special thanks to Gordon Chang, professor of history at Stanford University and author of Ghosts of Gold Mountain: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad (https://amzn.to/3hgDtOH).
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The History Channel, original podcast. |
| 0:05.4 | History this week, May 10th, 1869. |
| 0:10.0 | I'm Sally Helm. |
| 0:15.7 | This place is home to rattlesnakes and dust. |
| 0:19.5 | It's a spot in the middle of the Utah desert, close to the Great Salt Lake. |
| 0:23.0 | The area has very few residents, but today it sort of feels like the dead center of the country. |
| 0:33.2 | For years now, two railroad companies have been laying down track that will connect the nation |
| 0:38.9 | coast to coast. Once the Transcontinental Railroad is finished, a trip that used to take six months |
| 0:45.2 | can happen in just one week. One company started laying track in the east, another in the west. |
| 0:53.2 | And today they'll meet in the middle. Here at a place called Permanentory Summit. |
| 0:59.7 | To mark the occasion, railroad officials have come to this barren spot to drive in the last spike |
| 1:06.4 | on the railroad tracks. The spikes were normally made of iron, but the last one, the golden spike, |
| 1:13.0 | is made out of California gold. Railroad workers drill holes so that the ceremonial spike won't |
| 1:18.9 | get damaged as it's driven into the ground. And then, the story goes that the officials miss |
| 1:26.5 | on the first swing. But eventually, the Transcontinental Railroad is officially finished. |
| 1:36.4 | It will change American life in profound ways. Some historians have called this the most |
| 1:41.6 | important moment in 19th century America. Photographers are on hand for the day's ceremony. |
| 1:48.7 | The most famous picture is taken by AJ Russell. His subjects are two massive locomotives sitting |
| 1:55.8 | face to face on this newly unified track. The pictures are in black and white, but the locomotives |
| 2:01.7 | themselves are ornate and colorful. One is blue with crimson and brass detailing. The other is adorned |
| 2:09.6 | with landscape paintings. The two chief railroad engineers stand in front of these fancy looking |
| 2:15.3 | trains to shake hands. There are about a hundred other men in the picture. Railroad workers and |
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