The Railway Conquest of the World

by Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot

The railway has passed through many financial tribulations. On two occasions the intermediary of a receiver has been found necessary. It was hit by a panic in its very earliest days, and it failed ten years after completion, the second breakdown precipitating one of the worst financial scares in the history of the States. From the ashes, however, a new company was reconstructed, a bolder and more enterprising body of men gripped the reins, the system was pulled to pieces from end to end and rebuilt. To-day it is not only one of the finest railways in America, but one of the most popular and successful as well.

Running parallel with the Northern Pacific across the continent, but some miles nearer the international boundary, is another great artery of steel which has become a great transportation force in the United States. This is the Great Northern, likewise built through the energy of one man, Mr. James J. Hill, the empire-builder of the Great American west. Mr. Hill is a born railway magnate, and when he shook the dust of his native land—Canada—from his feet, it was merely because the Dominion at that time offered him no scope for his energies and initiative.

His life is one romance; a prolonged conquest with the unknown country, with the railway as his weapon, and with which he has overcome tremendous obstacles. The Great Northern was driven slowly across the country from the Great Lakes. Advance was risky, as the country traversed failed to promise an ounce of produce; but whenever the organiser saw that development in the country ahead was likely to take place, he drove the line forward. His motto was that “the railway must be a pioneer, leaving the settler to be brought in afterwards.” He lost no opportunity to gain revenue. For instance, when the mineral wealth of Montana attracted widespread attention, he made a journey to Butte. He found that it was costing the mines £3 8s.—$17—per ton to ship their copper to Omaha. He pondered on the subject, and suddenly announced his intention to carry his railway into Butte. He did so, and the first stroke he consummated was to transport the metal to the same eastern point at £1 13s., or $8, per ton—about 50 per cent. below the previous rate.

The desolate character of the plains of Montana, and the towering heights of the Rocky Mountains which stood right in the way of the line, were far from being attractive from the financial point of view. Yet he was convinced that traffic could be created, and was fortunate in infusing his colleagues with his enthusiasm. But if the railway’s future was precarious, that of the settler was much more so. For some miles the line ran through territory inhabited by the Indian, and which the Red Man stubbornly persisted in maintaining was his property. The result was that the white man could only live on sufferance. If he stopped too long while passing through the country he was told to move on. Mr. Hill relates an amusing instance of Red determination to seize the main chance at the settler’s expense. “When the settlers drove their cattle across Indian country in order to gain the railway, the Indians exacted a toll of 50 cents, or 2s. for the privilege of driving the cattle across three miles of their territory! They even wanted an additional amount per head—I don’t remember what it was—for the water they drank while crossing the Missouri River!”

Among the Rockies the engineer met with a spirited resistance, and the result is that the railway describes a tortuous course as it climbs up the one, and drops down the other, side. At places one may stand on the edge of a cliff where the track has been cut, and watch it following the spur for miles, steadily falling meanwhile to the head of the valley, where it describes a sweeping curve to wind back along the face of the cliff on the opposite side of the depression. Straight across it is, perhaps, not more than a mile or so, but the long detour of several miles was necessary to avoid a heavier climb. The fight for the grade is emphasised in watching an approaching train coming up the hill. It rounds the bluff on the opposite side of the valley, two ponderous 170-ton locomotives pulling and straining amid clouds of smoke and steam. Their joint labour produces a speed of about 15 miles an hour, and the roar created by the steam in harness is heard distinctly across the ravine. One follows the train on its winding course, for it is fully in sight the whole time as it swings round the curve at the end of the valley, and presently rushes by one with a terrible roar. Some twelve minutes have passed since the train first came into sight.

Among the Cascades the spectacle is more impressive. Travelling westwards, the train pauses at the mountain’s summit, and an electric locomotive is attached to haul the cars through the Cascade tunnel, a bore as straight as an arrow through the mass of rock for three miles. In ten minutes the train regains daylight, and the electric locomotive makes way for a ponderous 170-ton vibrating mass of steel and steam for the downward descent. When the railway was first opened, the crest of the range was overcome by a big switch-back, but it did not meet with official satisfaction, so it was abandoned in favour of the tunnel driven through the crest.

Directly the engine-driver releases the air-brake the train commences to move. The descent is at the rate of 116 feet to the mile, and, as may be conceived, no steaming is required to give the train momentum down the banks—it travels by gravity alone, held in check by the powerful air-brake. The train plunges into a line of snowsheds, and when it emerges, two tracks at different levels may be seen, and in the far distance, on the opposite side of the valley, is the black band of steel writhing among the crags to pass from sight round a distant shoulder. The train swings down the uppermost gallery, crosses a lofty trestle set over a rift on a curve, dives into a tunnel wherein a horse-shoe loop is completed, so that when it issues from the other portal the train speeds along the second track in the opposite direction. Then it makes another twist to swing to the opposite mountain slope. Looking back from the lowest level, the line can be seen cutting three ugly gashes among the trees clothing the mountain flanks.

The construction of this series of loops was exciting, and dangerous to the navvies, as one of their number related to me. Excavation was carried out on the two levels simultaneously, but those on the lower terrace had to maintain a vigilant eye and a keen ear. Huge ballast cars were hauled on to the upper gallery loaded with debris, and they shot this over the side to build up the grade. The result was that the men below were subjected to a heavy, intermittent bombardment, for massive pieces of rock were among the spoil. These, given a start down-hill, bounced from point to point with terrific force, until they crashed into the depths of the canyon. The men had to dodge these missiles as best they could. Sometimes they were lucky; at others they were not, and many a man received a nasty wound, a jarring blow, or a broken limb from a piece of rock in flight. Accidents from this cause were numerous, and fatalities were not infrequent.

When the Western Pacific was projected it was decided to profit from the mistakes made on the early lines in the first instance. Grades in particular were to be kept down, especially among the mountains, where a maximum rise of 1 in 100 was only to be allowed. This line completes the original idea in connection with the Denver & Rio Grande line by giving the latter an outlet from Salt Lake City to the Pacific at San Francisco.