Steve and the Steam Engine

by Sara Ware Bassett

He paused, half closing his eyes amid the cloud of smoke.

"To begin with, the promoters of the enterprise received scant encouragement to attack the problem, for few persons of that day had much faith in the undertaking. In place of help, ridicule cropped up from many sources. It was absurd, the public said, to expect such a wild-cat scheme to succeed. Why, over six hundred miles of the area to be covered did not contain a tree and in consequence there would be nothing from which to make cross-ties. And where was the workmen's food to come from if they were plunged into a wilderness beyond the reach of civilization? The thing couldn't be done. It was impossible. Of course it was a wonderful idea. But it never could be carried out. Where were the men to be found who would be willing to take their lives in their hands and set forth to work where Indians or wild beasts were liable to devour them at any moment? Moreover, to build a railroad of such length would take a lifetime and where was the money coming from? For you must remember that the men of that period had no such vast fortunes as many of them have now, and it was no easy task to finance a scheme where the outlay was so tremendous and the probability of success so shadowy. Even as late as 1856 the whole notion was considered visionary by the greater part of the populace."

"But the fun of doing it, Dad!" ejaculated Stephen, with sparkling eyes.

"The fun of it!" repeated his father with a shrug. "Yes, there was fun in the adventure, there is no denying that; and fortunately for the dreamers who saw the vision, men were found who felt precisely as you do. Youth always puts romance above danger, and had there not been these romance lovers it would have gone hard with the trans-continental railroads. We might never have had them. As it was, even the men who ventured to cast in their lot with the promoters had the caution to demand their pay in advance. They had no mind to be deluded into working for a precarious wage. At length enough toilers from the east and from the west were found who were willing to take a chance with their physical safety, and the enterprise was begun."

Stephen straightened up in his chair.

"Had the only obstacle confronting them been the reach of uncharted country ahead that would have been discouraging enough. Fancy pushing your way through eight hundred miles of territory that had never been touched by civilization! And while you are imagining that, do not forget that the slender ribbon of track left behind was your only link with home; and your only hope of getting food, materials, and sometimes water. Ah, you would have had excitement enough to satisfy you had you been one of that company of workmen! On improvised trucks they put up bunks and here they took turns in sleeping while some of their party stood guard to warn them of night raids from Indians and wild beasts. Even in the daytime outposts had to be stationed; and more than once, in spite of every precaution, savages descended on the little groups of builders, overpowered them, and slaughtered many of the number or carried away their provisions and left them to starve. Sometimes marauders tore up the tracks, thereby breaking the connection with the camps in the rear from which aid could be summoned; and in early railroad literature we find many a tale of heroic engineers who ran their locomotives back through almost certain destruction in order to procure help for their comrades. Supply trains were held up and swept clean of their stores; paymasters were robbed, and sometimes murdered, so no money reached the employees; every sort of calamity befell the men. Hundreds of the ten thousand Chinese imported to work at a microscopic wage died of sickness or exposure to the extreme heat or cold."

"Gee!" gasped Stephen, "I'd no idea it was so bad as all that!"

"Most persons have but a faint conception of the price paid for our railways—paid not alone in money but in human life," answered Mr. Tolman. "The route of the western railroads, you see, did not lie solely through flat, thickly wooded country. Our great land, you must remember, is made up of a variety of natural formations, and in crossing from the Atlantic coast to that of the Pacific we get them one after another. In contrast to the forests of mighty trees, with their tangled undergrowth, there were stretches of prairie where no hills broke the level ground; another region contained miles and miles of alkali desert, dry and scorching, where the sun blazed so fiercely down on the steel rails that they became too hot to touch. Here men died of sunstroke and of fever; and some died for want of water. Then directly in the railroad's path arose the towering peaks of the Sierras and Rockies whose snowy crests must be crossed, and whose cold, storms and gales must be endured. Battling with these hardships the workmen were forced to drill holes in the rocky summits and bolt their rough huts down to the earth to prevent them from being blown away."

"I don't see how the thing could have been done!" Steve exclaimed, with growing wonder.

"And you must not forget to add to the chapter of tribulations the rivers that barred the way; the ravines that must either be filled in or bridged; the rocks that had to be blasted out; and the mountains that must be climbed or tunneled."