A hundred years ago last week, about 500 Irish and Chinese laborers, politicians, railroad men and prostitutes gathered on a lonely plateau at Promontory, Utah, to witness a momentous event: the joining of East to West by the first transcontinental railroad. Central Pacific President Leland Stanford picked up a silver sledgehammer, swung at. the final spike and missed. Union Pacific Vice President Thomas Durant took his turn—and also missed. Finally, a Union Pacific laborer stepped up and drove it home. A waiting telegrapher tapped out the message: "The Pacific railroad is...
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