Excerpt from Souvenir and Views of Union Pacific, "the Overland Route" The World's Pictorial Line (En Route to California)

Interior pullman palace sleeping car, ON union pacific railroad.'and embracing the whole temperate zone. We can run a road through and through, the whole distance, under our flag and under our laws. An American road to India, through the heart of our country, will revive upon its line all the wonders of which'we have read, and eclipse them. The Western wilderness, from the Pacific to the Mississippi, will start into life at its touch. Let us act up to the greatness of the occasion, and show ourselves worthy of the extraordinary circumstances in which we are placed, while we can. An American road to India - central and natural - for ourselves and our posterity, now and hereafter, for thousands of years to come.

People who thought for a long time that the whole scheme was wild and visionary, began after awhile to realize that out fest, on the Great American Desert, an extremely interesting enterprise was afoot, and that whatever came of it, one thing was certain, the world had never seen railroad building on so grand a scale, under such overpowering disadvantages, and at such a rapid rate of progress. It opened fresh fields to the news paper correspondents, and a theme of -uncommon interest for the press. After the first year the newspapers of the country began to be filled with accounts of the progress of the work, with descriptions of the methods pursued in construction, and the physical aspect of the country traversed. Public interest had gradually been wrought up in this way to such an extent that during the last year of construction it was the prominent topic; and the progress made in track laying was telegraphed all over the country each day. It cul minated on May to, 1869, when in all the large cities in the Union business stood still while the telegraph clicked the blows of the hammer that drove the last spike.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.