The Impact of the Pacific Railroad on the Pacific Northwest

Posted byRebecca MillsPosted inUncategorized

Asa Whitney and other Americans advocated for a railroad connecting the Pacific Northwest to the rest of the United States and transforming the region into an economic powerhouse. This proposed railroad would provide settlers access to Eastern markets and inexpensive transportation options for their goods. However, transcontinental railroads in the Pacific Northwest did not fully become a reality until the 1880s.

During the mid-to-late nineteenth century, the railroad transformed the Pacific Northwest from an isolated region to one that many Americans hoped would become a booming economic powerhouse.[1] New York merchant Asa Whitney reasoned that “Pacific railways” would provide settlers with an efficient and inexpensive mode of transporting their goods and services across the U.S.[2] He proposed that Congress should set aside “a strip of land sixty miles wide” from the western coast of Lake Michigan to “the Pacific Coast,” and that the railroad route should be constructed “through the South Pass of the Rockies.”[3] However, although many Americans shared Whitney’s beliefs about a railroad in the Pacific Northwest, they disagreed with him on where the railway should begin.[4] These disagreements did not prevent the Federal Government from subsidizing a railroad that would alter the social and economic fabric of the West.[5]

 Beginning in the late 1840s and through the 1850s, some Americans began clamoring for a “transcontinental railroad” that would connect the eastern seaboard of the U.S. to the Pacific Northwest.[6] Like his counterpart, Asa Whitney, George Wilkes supported a “Pacific railroad” but argued that it should be funded by the Federal Government, not private corporations.[7] He believed the United States should embrace its “national duty” and construct a government-supported railroad.[8]  The Committee on Roads and Canals ultimately favored Whitney’s privately funded railroad proposal and rejected Wilkes’ calls for government railroad funding.[9] However, outside of expressing their sentiments for Whitney’s plan, Congress took no action on this issue until the Civil War forced them to consider the military implications of a railroad connecting the Pacific Northwest to the rest of the Union.[10]

 After the sectional conflict between the North and the South broke out in 1861, the United States reconsidered the merits of a “Pacific railroad” and passed the Pacific Railway Act in 1862.[11] This act enabled the Federal Government to provide the Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railroad companies with “government bonds” and massive land grants that subsidized the cost of constructing these railroads between 1863 and 1869.[12] In return, the United States expected these companies to build and maintain railways that began in Sacramento, California, and Omaha, Nebraska, and met in Promontory, Utah.[13] However, even though the U.S. funded and supported a “transcontinental railroad,” it was not until the late 1870s and early 1880s that railroad companies earnestly began constructing railways in the Pacific Northwest.[14]

 After completing the first “transcontinental railroad” in 1869, American companies began constructing new rail lines that would finally connect the Pacific Northwest to the rest of the country and bring hopes of economic prosperity to the region.[15] Journalist Henry Villard completed one of the many Pacific transcontinental railways when he connected his line with the Union Pacific Company’s Montana railroad in 1883.[16] These railroads spurred the migration of more settlers to the region, leading to the construction of new towns, such as Detroit, Oregon.[17] The newly constructed railways connected these communities to the rest of the United States and provided them with inexpensive and easily accessible transportation for their goods, such as lumber.[18] Ultimately, the construction of the railroad transformed the Pacific Northwest from an isolated region into a populated land teeming with possibilities.

[1] Bob H. Reinhardt, Struggle on the North Santiam: Power and Community on the Margins of the American West (Corvallis: Oregon State University Press, 2020), 32; F.G. Young, “The History of Railway Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” The Quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society 12, no. 2 (June 1911): 174.

[2] Randall V. Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” The Quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society 47, no. 3 (September 1946): 287; Asa Whitney, A Project for a Railroad to the Pacific (New York: George W. Wood, 1849), 12, https://library.si.edu/digital-library/book/projectforrailro00whit

[3] Margaret L. Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 20, No. 2 (September 1933): 211.

[4] Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 215.

[5] Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 287-288; “Railroads in the Late 19th Century,” Library of Congress, accessed October 8, 2023, https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide/citation-guide-1.html

[6] Whitney, A Project for a Railroad to the Pacific, 12; Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 287; Young, “The History of Railway Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 180; Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 210.

[7] Young, “The History of Railway Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 181; Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 215.

[8] Young, “The History of Railway Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 181; Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 215.

[9] Young, “The History of Railway Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 181; Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 215.

[10] “The Transcontinental Railroad,” Library of Congress, accessed October 8, 2023,

https://www.loc.gov/collections/railroad-maps-1828-to-1900/articles-and-essays/history-of-railroads-and-maps/the-transcontinental-railroad/

[11] “Pacific Railway Act (1862),” The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, last modified May 10, 2022, https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/pacific-railway-act#transcript; Brown, “Asa Whitney and His Pacific Railroad Publicity Campaign,” 215.

[12] “Pacific Railway Act (1862),” https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/pacific-railway-act#transcript; “Landmark Legislation: The Pacific Railway Act of 1862,” The United States Senate, accessed October 8, 2023, https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/PacificRailwayActof1862.htm; “Congress and the American West: The Transcontinental Railroad,” The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, accessed October 8, 2023,  https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/treasures_of_congress/text/page15_text.html

[13] “Congress and the American West: The Transcontinental Railroad,” https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/treasures_of_congress/text/page15_text.html

[14] C.J. Smith, “Early Development of Railroads in the Pacific Northwest,” The Washington Historical Quarterly 13, no. 4 (October 1922): 243-244.

[15] Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 288-289.

[16] Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 291-292.

[17] Bob Reinhardt, “City of Detroit,” Oregon Historical Society, last modified September 12, 2022, https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/city_of_detroit/; Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 300.

[18] Whitney, A Project for a Railroad to the Pacific, 12; Mills, “A History of Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” 287.

Old Detroit in 1900. Courtesy of the North Santiam Historical Society.
Oregon Central and Eastern Railroad Through Old Detroit. Courtesy of the North Santiam Historical Society.

Further Reading

Citation Info

Mills, Rebecca. “The Impact of the Pacific Railroad on the Pacific Northwest” The Atlas of Drowned Towns (blog). October 10, 2023.

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