The Hidden History of Chinese Immigrants Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad

Recently, my friends and I were talking about different ways to “slow travel” the continental U.S. I even looked up cross-country routes on Amtrak with names like Adirondack, Pacific Surfliner and Coast Starlight. The U.S. government has publicly announced its intention to invest billions into passenger rail—an eco-friendly alternative to flying and driving—and that’s a good thing.

But did you know, coast-to-coast railway travel was made possible by the labor of thousands of Chinese immigrants? At the height of the construction, 80-90% of the railroad workforce was Chinese. This article will cover the often untold history of the Chinese immigrants that built one of the most significant civil engineering marvels of the 19th century.

The Amtrak Coast Starlight is a daily train between Los Angeles and Seattle. *Getty Images*

Colonial Dreams of an Iron Road

Before the first steel-driving men hammered drills into rock, and even before the U.S. gained access to lands west of the Mississippi River, wealthy white elites began promoting the idea of a railroad that would span an entire continent. With the Monroe doctrine (1823), Manifest Destiny became the U.S. government’s unofficial foreign policy. Then, the discovery of gold in 1848 put even more pressure on the U.S. government to expedite the project. You could hardly call it a Gold Rush when 49ers heading west had to travel six months overland or six months by boat to get to California. The U.S. government was determined to find a faster way to transport mail, goods, and people from coast to coast.

When the federal government finally passed the 1862 Railway Act, the next step was to figure out how to overcome the challenges posed by the American landscape. West of the Mississippi, the flat plains made it easy to expand the railroad from Chicago to Ogden, Utah. However, the next section of track would have to pass through the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Irish labor built the Union Pacific railroad (UPRR) over the Great Plains. However, the Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR), which blasted and tunneled its way through granite in the Sierra Nevada and Rocky Mountains—was primarily built by Chinese immigrants after white workers backed out due to dangerous working conditions.

Portrait of a Chinese immigrant (c. 1869). *Photo credit: Carleton Watkins,_J Paul Getty Museum*

Recruiting Chinese Immigrants

After placing an advertisement seeking 5,000 men, the Central Pacific Railroad company was only able to recruit a few hundred men, mostly Irish immigrants. Due to extremely dangerous working conditions and low pay, many of the new hires abandoned the project to seek their fortunes in the recently opened Nevada silver mines instead.

The plan to use Chinese immigrants to build the railroad was initially met with resistance. At the time, Chinese laborers faced extreme violence and racism while government officials looked the other way. Even so, Central Pacific Railroad executives felt their strategy was profitable. They initially recruited a group of roughly 50 Chinese men. Incredibly impressed with their performance, they began exclusively hiring Chinese immigrants and even went as far as China to recruit laborers. Different sources estimate that from 1865 to the railroad’s completion in 1869, anywhere from 10,000 to 20,000 Chinese workers were employed by the Central Pacific Railroad (CPR), or 80 to 90% of the company’s workforce.

“More than a dozen Chinese laborers work at laying these tracks in the Sierra Nevada mountains for the Central Pacific Railroad, supervised by a Caucasian foreman in a white shirt and vest. In the mid-1800s, the railroads turned to Chinese and Irish laborers to perform the dangerous work of constructing bridges and lying track in rugged deserts and mountainous terrain..” *Photo credit: Carleton Watkins [Trestle on Central Pacific Railroad], negative 1877, J. Paul Getty Museum*

Racialized Labor after the US Civil War

At the height of railroad construction, from 1863 to 1865, the federal government was predominantly occupied with a bloody Civil War (1861-1865). News of the near-exclusive use of Chinese labor raised concerns that the federally-funded project was instituting race-based slavery by other means.

Around 1865, Central Pacific Railroad executives and investors were called to testify before Congress and assure the government that the near-exclusive use of Chinese labor was paid and in no way similar to the practice of slavery.

The Central Pacific Railroad Company often used violent labor enforcement practices to curtail the movement of newly hired immigrants in railroad work camps. Wages were also used to control the upward mobility of immigrant workers within the company hierarchy. Chinese workers, though compensated for their work, were still paid about $10-15 less than their White counterparts.

Working conditions were incredibly dangerous and workers were offered no protections. In the words of one former railroad worker,

The work at Hope was very dangerous. On one occasion, there was a huge rock

on the slope of the mountain that stood in the railroad’s path and must be removed

by blasting before the tracks could go through.

It is estimated that about 1 in 10 Chinese laborers working on the Sierra Nevada leg of the transcontinental railroad died from inter-racial violence, rockslides, explosions, environmental exposure, violence and even avalanches.

June 25, 1867: Labor Strikes Back

Paid less than their white counterparts and working under dangerous conditions, on June 25, 1867, Chinese laborers staged a strike demanding equal pay, shorter workdays, and better working conditions. The strike lasted about a week and only stopped when the Central Pacific Railroad company stopped feeding the workers and threatened the lives of the remaining strikers.

The work stoppage, though unsuccessful, became the largest collective labor action in the country. It was a huge step for the American labor movement after the end of the Civil War.

Post-Script: Honoring the Legacy of Asian Railroad Workers

Central Pacific Railroad snow plow near Cisco. *Source: Online Archive of California*

For years following the completion of the first transcontinental railroad, the survivors often journeyed back to the Sierra to search for the human remains of lost colleagues (called jup seen you or retrieving dead friends).

For those who survived, railroad construction allowed immigrants to gain steady employment and create careers in early American railroad companies. For others, savings from their wages allowed them to pay off loans, support relatives across North America and China, and start small businesses.
The stability provided by their sacrifice helped to support the development of Chinatowns even after a series of Federal laws restricted immigration from China and severely curtailed economic opportunities for those who remained in the United States. Chinatowns also provided a safe haven for former railroad workers as anti-Chinese sentiment coupled with an unstable economy helped spur intense racial violence in rural areas of the Western United States.

So, the next time you decide to take the train across the country, find opportunities along the way to explore and honor the hidden history of the Chinese laborers who built the first transcontinental railroad

For more information - and to hear second-hand accounts from the descendants of railroad workers - check out the Chinese Railroad Workers Project coordinated and developed by Stanford University.