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Today we shine a spotlight on this photograph of the golden spike ceremony taken in Promontory, Utah. As school lets out and vacation begins, we’re changing up our posts for the summer. Look for these spotlights highlighting great documents, photographs,
posters, and more from our holdings.
The Transcontinental Railroad was completed on May 10, 1869, when four ceremonial gold and silver spikes were driven into a laurel wood railroad tie at Promontory Summit, northwest of Salt Lake City, Utah. This act joined 1,776 miles of rail belonging to the Union and Central Pacific railroads. The Union Pacific’s engine, 119, is on the left; the Central Pacific’s Jupiter is on the right. The ceremonial spikes and tie were removed and replaced with iron and pine.
This image of the ceremony comes from the Historical File of the Department of Agriculture’s Office of Information and is stored in our Still Pictures branch at the National Archives building in College Park, Maryland.
You can find it and use it to create teaching activities on DocsTeach, our online tool for teaching with documents.
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Western settlers longed for a faster and easier way to travel across the West. Emigrants traveling by horseback, wagon, or foot required several months to cross the plains and the Rocky Mountains. Trains made travel faster, safer, and much less physically taxing, but there was no transcontinental railroad that connected the country from east to west in the mid-nineteenth century. Technology and political incentives made it feasible for
the country to contemplate a transcontinental railroad. By the late nineteenth century, the transcontinental railroad came to fruition. The Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroad companies laid hundreds of miles of tracks, but needed a place to connect. On April 8, 1869, Grenville M. Dodge, chief engineer of the Union Pacific, along with Collis Potter Huntington, president of the Central Pacific, met with Congressman Sam Hooper to settle the debate of where the two railroads would
meet. Together they concluded on Promontory Summit, “at which place the rails shall meet and connect and form one continuous line.” Located in Utah, Promontory Summit (also referred to as Promontory Point) is an area of high ground northwest of Salt Lake City. Here, at Promontory Summit, on May 10, 1869, three spikes were driven into the ground to commemorate the completion of the transcontinental railroad. The spikes symbolized different areas of the country coming together, like the
different railroads that came together. The most famous spike, the golden spike, was made from California gold, the silver spike from Nevada alloy silver, and the iron spike from a combination of Arizona metals, connecting these Western states permanently in one symbolic tie of the railroad. A crowd of up to 1,000 people gathered at Promontory Summit on May 10, 1869 to witness the historic day when the railroads joined together as one. The Deseret News reported, “A thousand throbbing
hearts impulsively beat to the motion of the trains as the front locomotive of each company led on majestically up to the very verge of the narrow break between the lines, where, in a few moments, was to be consummated the nuptial rites uniting the gorgeous east and the imperial west of America, with the indissoluble seal of inter-oceanic commerce.” Today, Promontory Summit, forever tied to the railroad, houses a Visitor Center and Engine House where people can experience the history of
the transcontinental railroad.
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Skip Interactive Map6200 North 22300th Street West, Corinne, UT 84307Cite this Page
Emma Tolman, Brigham Young University, “The Golden Spike: Promontory Summit and the Transcontinental Railroad,” Intermountain Histories, accessed December 15, 2022, //www.intermountainhistories.org/items/show/189.
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Published on May 30, 2018. Last updated on Dec 5, 2022.
May 10, 1869
Golden Spike Ceremony, Promontory Summit, Utah
After a washed-out bridge and a Union Pacific labor dispute delayed the ceremony for two days, the Union Pacific No. 119 and Central Pacific Jupiter met at Promontory Summit, Utah — drawn almost nose to nose and separated by the width of a single railroad tie. Ceremonial spikes were tapped by a special silver spike maul into the ceremonial laurel tie. Dignitaries and workers gathered around the locomotives to watch Central Pacific President Leland Stanford drive the ceremonial gold spike to officially join the two railroads. Telegraph operators transmitted the blows of the hammer, as East met West and started a new chapter in western expansion. The line operated until 1904, when it was replaced by the Lucin Cutoff. The original line was removed for scrap at the beginning of World War II.
There were four ceremonial spikes given that day: Two gold-plated spikes given by the State of California to Leland Stanford, President of Central Pacific; one silver spike given to both railroads by the State of Nevada and a gold and silver spike given by the Territory of Arizona to Union Pacific Railroad. Today, this gold and silver spike is on display in Council Bluffs, Iowa, at the Union Pacific Railroad Museum. Both the silver spike from the State of Nevada and one of the gold spikes from the State of California are in the collection of the Cantor Museum at Stanford University. The other gold spike, considered lost for decades, is at the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento, Calif.
Union Pacific celebrates the shared stories that have shaped our country since 1862. We invite you to explore how the nation’s largest railroad came to be and how UP continues to build America with innovation and tenacity, touching the lives of nearly every citizen.