Who worked on the railroad?
Chinese laborers made up a majority of the Central Pacific workforce that built out the transcontinental railroad east from California. The rails they laid eventually met track set down by the Union Pacific, which worked westward. On May 10, 1869, the golden spike was hammered in at Promontory, Utah.
Which group of immigrants worked on the railroad and faced discrimination?
A drawing shows a group of Chinese laborers building a railroad. Several of the workers are conversing with one another. Prohibited by law in 1790 from obtaining US citizenship through naturalization, Chinese immigrants faced harsh discrimination and violence from American settlers in the West.
What law requires immigrants to read and write?
The Immigration Act of 1917 (also known as the Literacy Act and less often as the Asiatic Barred Zone Act) was a United States Act that aimed to restrict immigration by imposing literacy tests on immigrants, creating new categories of inadmissible persons, and barring immigration from the Asia-Pacific zone.
How much money did the Chinese immigrants get paid?
According to the Project, Chinese workers hired in 1864 were paid $26 a month, working six days a week. They eventually held an eight-day strike in June of 1867.
Who are the immigrants who worked on the Union Pacific Railroad?
In addition to Chinese workers and Latter-Day Saints who worked for Central Pacific, Irish immigrants fleeing famine and newly freed slaves laid track across the Great Plains for the Union Pacific Railroad. Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao champions railroad workers at the 150th anniversary of the Golden Spike Ceremony on May 10.
Where did immigrants come from to build the transcontinental railroad?
The major groups of immigrants that worked on the transcontinental railroad were from Ireland and China. How many workers died building the transcontinental railroad?
Who are the Chinese workers on the transcontinental railroad?
The construction of the Transcontinental Railroad was an engineering feat of human endurance, with the western leg built largely by thousands of immigrant Chinese laborers. Chinese laborers on a wood train, about 1866 Courtesy of Society of California Pioneers
Who was the leader of the transcontinental railroad?
Leland Stanford, president of Central Pacific, former California governor and founder of Stanford University, told Congress in 1865, that the majority of the railroad labor force were Chinese. More Chinese immigrants began arriving in California, and two years later, about 90 percent of the workers were Chinese.