1863-1865: The Big Thing

December 2, 1863
The UP breaks ground in Omaha, Nebraska, but does not commence building.

November 29, 1864
The U.S. Army slaughters 150 unarmed Indians, including women and children, at Sand Creek, Colorado.

January 7, 1865
Native American raiders destroy Julesburg, Colorado, seeking revenge for the Sand Creek massacre.

April 9, 1865
Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders to the Union Army.

July 10, 1865
Following pressure from Washington, D.C., the first UP rails are finally spiked in Omaha.

Rolling Dormitories

The UP built special boxcars to accommodate the track-laying crew. Each car was eighty-five feet long. Many were outfitted with three-tiered bunk beds, a central passage and skylights. Others served as dining cars, with kitchens. One car housed a bakery, another a butcher, and a third contained a huge pantry of flour, oats and other supplies. The rolling dormitories were set to go by the time the spring thaw arrived.

The Vast Herd

"This is the great buffalo country of the West, and sometimes a black, surging mass can be seen extending in every direction as far as the eye can reach, the herd running up into thousands and thousands."
-- surveyor Arthur Ferguson

"A buffalo road becomes a warpath... and finally the macadamized or railroad of the scientific man."
-- Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton

As UP crews headed West, they encountered animals central to the Plains Indians' way of life: bison, also known as North American buffalo. Indians made use of the buffalo in dozens of ways: as food, as a source of teepee-building materials, for making weapons and other supplies. The Native Americans' most important resource was also a potent symbol, for many tribes, of life itself. Before white men arrived in the West, a vast herd of buffalo, somewhere between 15 and 60 million animals, roamed the plains. At the end of the 19th century, after the railroad was completed and white settlers arrived, less than a thousand would remain.

The Crédit Mobilier Scam

"It is very easy to speak of these men as thieves and speculators. But there was no human being, when the Union Pacific railroad was proposed, who regarded it as other than a wild-cat venture... They played a great game, and they played for either a complete failure or a brilliant prize."
-- railroad executive Charles Francis Adams

UP executive Thomas Durant, who made a fortune as a Civil War smuggler and a stock manipulator, established a secret organization called the Crédit Mobilier to generate profit for himself and other insiders. The Union Pacific issued dummy construction contracts to individuals who then turned them over to the Crédit Mobilier. Durant basically hired himself to build the railroad, insuring that the construction payments went into his own pocket.

Investors were allowed to purchase stock in the Crédit Mobilier with limited liability, that is, without risking their own personal wealth. With this limited liability, it didn't even matter if the railroad was built. Durant delayed the start of construction as long as he could, even making the route more circuitous. After all, more miles meant more profit.

Eastern Starting Point

"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."
-- surveyor Peter Dey

Council Bluffs, Iowa, was chosen as the railroad's eastern starting point thanks to the efforts of Grenville Dodge. The young engineer considered it the start of the most feasible route west. In 1859 Dodge met presidential hopeful Abraham Lincoln and described Council Bluffs' virtues as a starting point for a transcontinental railroad. At the Republican National Convention in 1860, Iowa delegates supported Lincoln, who won office in a deeply divided race. In 1863 he returned the political favor by choosing Council Bluffs as the railroad's starting point.

UP executive Thomas Clark Durant was delighted with the choice; he had invested in real estate in Omaha, Nebraska, just across the river. With his own interests in mind, Durant relegated Council Bluffs to a ceremonial starting point for the push west.