Searching for Chinese Workers Who Built the U.S. Transcontinental Railroad

Between 1865 and 1869, thousands of Chinese migrants toiled at a grueling pace and in perilous working conditions to help construct America's First Transcontinental Railroad. At any given moment during construction, 10,000 to 15,000 Chinese workers were on the job. And yet remarkably, not a single document created by one of these workers – not even a letter – has ever been found.

Two Stanford scholars are leading a multi-year, transnational research endeavor that aims to finally give a voice to the Chinese laborers whose blasting techniques and sheer fortitude built the railway across the inhospitable mountains of the Sierra Nevada.

You can read more about this effort in an article by Corrie Goldman in the Stanford University News at http://goo.gl/QZ6fF.

My thanks to newsletter reader Mark Woodward for telling me about this story.

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