how we interpret the history of arlington. here we have the story of slavery. and this place represents the founding ideals of this country. georgeme built to honor washington, to value and celebrate the founder of the country, the house itself built by slaves, but then you have the family as well, the family relationship. george washington parke custis innocence -- in essence had two daughters. one was white. was enslaved. both great granddaughters of martha washington. onwhat's the entire program american history tv sunday at 6 p.m. eastern, only on c-span3. isamerican history tv

featuring natural and historic sites throughout the country visited by our c-span cities tour staff. this is american history tv, only on c-span3. >> so, we are at promontory summit, utah. i am walking you over to where the transcontinental railroad was completed. this spot right here marked by tie, is within inches of where the original ceremony was held. included on this is a plaque that lists the dignitaries from this company. the big are all marked there. four another thing that you can see at the site is a connection with resources that would have

been available to the two companies building the railroad. we have tried to make it as authentic as possible. if you look to the west, you will see precut ties. they had sawmills and brought them down from the mountain. whereas the union pacific, coming from the east, had to head cut their ties wherever they could find wood. not a lot available and a lot of the areas, so they would split them and you can see them and how they would cut them to bring them out when they could. the transcontinental railroad was happening at the end of the victorian age as you were going into the industrial age and it was a perfect time for the united states. when the railroad was completed, it made a major impact in the industrial development of the nation. it was over 6.5 years. took just over six and a half

years, built from 1862-1869. time period they started building the transcontinental railroad was when a lot of people were coming out after the gold rush and the silver rush was taking off. we were in the middle of the civil war. abraham lincoln really wanted to have access to all the materials that were available in the sierra nevadas, including the gold and silver, and connect the states in the united states. he chose that time to complete the act and start building the railroad. in the middle of the war, the defense of the country was a major factor that was making the decision and they wanted to get troops across the country in a quicker span of time. there were finished goods that would go to states in the west. it was hopefully going to be cut

and that was lincoln's school. -- abraham lincoln's goal, to get troops across the country. and it ended up being 7-10 days. able to get things across the country when it was completed. the companies that built the transcontinental railroad were the central pacific, starting in sacramento, and the union pacific, starting in omaha. there were already extensive rail systems back further east. one of the problems at the time was the companies were building before they got paid and almost always in debt and worried about money. the other problem was resources. a huge problem with resources. if you have ever traveled around wyoming and nebraska, there is not a lot of wood. if you look underneath the and ties had to be placed all along the route just

for the railroad. you also had to build buildings for water towers are just for the infrastructures operating the railroad across the country. because of the civil war they were in, another problem was finding manpower to build the railroad. actually the end of the civil , war, it was a huge help for the railroad company. you had veterans looking for a way to provide for their lives and their livelihood and there was a ready employer in the railroad company. for the central pacific, this is a bigger concern. a lot of times early on, a lot of workers would come on long enough to get money to mine. that is why the chinese were brought on, as in experiment. -- as an experiment. they brought on 50 chinese workers to test them out.

there was a lot of doubt because of their stature. they did not think they could withstand the 12 hour days six days a week. there was a lot of criticism and i guess you could say racism against the chinese. eventually they overcame the doubts and did a fantastic job. over 11,000 chinese were employed by the end of the transcontinental railroad by the two companies. as the companies approached each other, they were being paid land grants and did not want to give up ground to each other. so, instead of coming together and giving up and finding out where they would meet, they continued to build past one another until the federal government said that they were not going to pay them anymore until you figure out where you are going to meet. that is when they selected this spot right here where we are standing. and they had 30 miles of track to finish in the last month. you are looking down over some

of the wetlands of the great salt lake and major factors -- two major factors influenced the routes. one involved a fresh waters to refill the tanks on the steam locomotives and they needed to stay under a two percent grade, which is only 100 feet in elevation change every mile. as they were trying to find their way through utah, one of the challenges they faced was a large saltwater lake. would not allow any freshwater. they had to find a path around it. they were thinking about going through the wetlands. one of the engineers brought up, what if the lake level rises? they decided to come up on the foothills north of the lake, even though it presents more challenges with the grade. but to stay away from the lake and prevent flooding and damaging of the actual railroad.

another thing you can see from this side, if you look down below us, you can see the grade. i mentioned earlier the two companies building across the country, passed each other through utah with grade work because they did not want to give up federal money. down below us is the old union pacific grade. they sold their rights to the it would have been abandoned just before the completion of the transcontinental railroad. they sold their rights to the central pacific company. the central pacific had worked utah a lot longer and had a much higher quality grade. they bought the rights from the union pacific and switched over to this grade and that is where we are standing. we are coming up to the last cut made by the union pacific in the approach to promontory summit valley, that is right here. in just a minute, we will look down and you can actually see, in order to get through

different elevation changes, they would cut through the rock and blast with black powder. making these channels they could actually bill book -- build the railroad through. burns or hills on the far side of this cut. this is from the 1860's. you can see they put some bigger rocks to act as a retaining wall to keep it from collapsing into the cut. it is pretty neat. you can see work that lasted 150 years. [bell] >> as they approach the actual ceremony, they figured out the spot here at promontory summit.

a lot of people were interested in knowing when they would complete and it had a lot of reporters from all over the country i came out with dignitaries from the two companies. a lot of individuals would connect to the mainline and benefit with their businesses from that. the data was set for the completion, when the federal government made these companies set when and where they would finished was may 8. we hold the anniversary on may 10 because of the delay of the union pacific getting out here and them not being able to hold the ceremony until that day. when they held the ceremony, one of the neat stories is a ceremonial spike. they had four. -- they actually had for ceremonial spikes. including a solid gold, a solid silver, and the arizona spike.

iron, silver, and gold spike. and because a were precious metals, they could not drive the spike. they would pre-drill holes. they would place those precious metal spikes into those holes. we often get asked where the gold spike was. we do not know which position the gold spike would have held. they would have just placed it those and as part of the capped themd then as part of the ceremony. then they removed all that. there was a last spike that was driven. driving ofu hear the the last spike, it was not a gold spike. it was a regular iron spike that was linked to the telegraph. they put the telegraph wires around the spike in the hammer. so, when they drove it in, it sent a broadcast live coverage , across the country and actually started celebrations throughout the nation. during the ceremony, one of the famous pictures that you see is the champagne photo. for that photo there were two

here ontives that work site and they are known as the central pacific jupiter and they union pacific number 119. becomeocomotives have probably two of the most famous locomotives in american railroading. being able to let people see -era locomotives is kind of a cool way to commemorate that. after the ceremony, a lot of pictures were taken and the operation of the railroad became huge throughout the country because they were trying to increase the time and efficiency within these companies themselves, eventually the line passing through this area was bypassed and they built a trestle bridge and causeway across the great salt lake. on the nevada-utah border, straight across the point of the promontory mountains right

behind us, straight into often. that cut extra time, travel, money, all of that of have the operation of the transcontinental line. hub. became a huge materials and supplies all across the country. we had trains every hour and it became a major city, major thoroughfare for moving across the country. >> to mark the centennial of the national park service, we are featuring historic sites and national parks from the c-span cities tour. for more information about our travels, check out our website, www.c-span.org/citiestour. you're watching american history tv. all weekend, every weekend on c-span 3. >> coming up next, university of massachusetts-amherst professor

er talks aboutamme slavery both before and after emancipation. she talks about how free african-americans used photography. relationshiput the of the perception of african-americans in the postwar united states. this talk is about 50 minutes. >> all right, good evening. i am peter carmichael, professor of history at gettysburg college. it is my pleasure to introduce rauthamer. theis a professor at university of massachusetts-amherst. her first book i have right in front of me -- her first book