Donner Summit - The Chinese Laborers

Donner Summit - The Chinese Laborers. . , In constructing the transcontinental railroad Central Pacific found there was not enough labor and turned to importing Chinese labor. The Chinese eventually made up 80% of the work force of up to 12,000 workers. The Chinese were extremely courageous. Leaving their native homes in China for an unknown land and culture, they faced prejudice, discomfort, danger, and death. The Chinese laborers turned out to be instrumental to the construction of the railroad which tied California to the rest of the country enabling commerce, immigration, and the development of the West., Chinese Experience on Donner Summit, Originally the idea of using Chinese labor was laughed at. The Chinese were small in stature. Each rail weighed 532 lbs. and was 24 feet long. How could the Chinese ever lay those rails? Charles Crocker countered saying, “Did they not build the Chinese wall, the biggest piece of masonry in the world?” In fact the Chinese proved to be exceptionally hardworking and skilled workers and became the Central Pacific’s primary laborers., The Chinese endured frostbite, avalanche, accident, pneumonia, explosion, rock slide, disease, and continual cold through the winter. The Chinese lived in uninsulated buildings and during winter they sometimes went weeks without seeing the sun as they traveled from their camps to the work through snow tunnels. The winter of 1866-67 had one of the highest snowfalls on record: 40 feet. There were a total of 44 storms that winter with one multi-day storm dropping 10 feet of snow., China Wall , China Wall was constructed by the Chinese railroad workers using the material excavated from the tunnels. The face of the wall is constructed using no mortar. Instead, the rocks were shaped to fit against each other. One can still see the tool marks on the rocks., The work was long and hard, done all by hand and black powder explosives. Rocks were moved using baskets and small carts. The work went on 10-12 hours a day six days a week. In the tunnels they worked by candle and lantern light putting in eight hour days. The air was filled with rock dust and black powder residue. , For the work, the danger and the discomfort, the Chinese earned $28, then $30, and finally $35 a month, a third less than the white laborers who also had their board covered by the railroad., A Forgotten Legacy , With the completion of the transcontinental railroad, celebrations immediately broke out. In Sacramento there was a grand parade that included bands; the militia, the National Guard accompanied by artillery, firemen, machinists, blacksmiths, boilermakers, wagons with machinery; contingents of civic organizations; a boiler and attached smokestack; 29 omnibuses, carriages, and wagons of school children; politicians; a contingent of weavers; carriages, buggies, and horsemen, rail workers; wagons from the telegraph company and Wells Fargo; etc. Participants arrived in 18 trains. There was bunting, banners with stirring quotes, and flags; music, speeches and poems., There were however no Chinese at all. They’d been left out even though they had made up the vast majority of CPRR workers who filled the cuts, bored the tunnels, leveled the hills, cut the trees, drilled the holes, blasted and moved the rock, and laid the rail. They were the ones who laid the record ten miles of track in one day to win a bet for Charles Crocker, one of the Big 4., Not far in the future mobs would burn out Chinatowns and Chinese businesses along the route of the railroad and assault individual Chinese. Prejudice would be officially mandated by court decisions in California. Nationally, the Chinese Exclusionary Act would be passed just a dozen years later excluding Chinese from immigrating to the United States., Today the Chinese laborers that worked on the construction of the Transcontinental railroad have been recognized in the 150th anniversary celebration for the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. Their stories and legacy are being shared to honor the amazing contribution and sacrifices they made as a key part of building this monumental project