An air of excitement permeates the newspapers, the national government, the local community, virtually everyone is talking about it. It is a project that has taken decades to come to fruition, transforming the lives of all Americans, from coast to coast. The scale of the project is one of the largest the world has ever seen. It is the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10th, 1869.

Tracks from Omaha, Nebraska to Sacramento, California joined at Promontory Point, Utah. Two major companies laid the track: The Union Pacific, coming from the East, and the Central Pacific, from the West. A ceremony joins the tracks in a celebration ceremony, culminating in the driving of the “Final Spike”- or the “Golden Spike,” as it was called in later years, to band the two tracks together. The spike is hammered by LelandStanford, the President of the Central Pacific, and Thomas Durant, of the Union Pacific.

The country is now connected in a way never seen before, changing the People, Process, and Product involved in United States industry.