The Oregon State was expanded by the famous Oregon Trail. This trail also was the significant entrance to the entire western United States. All of these states: Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Idaho and Utah would probably not be a part of the United States today were it not for the Oregon Trail because the Trail was the only practicable way for settlers to get across the mountains. The journey west on the Oregon Trail was so difficult. One people in tem died along the way. Many walked the entire two-thousand miles barefoot.
“The first emigrants to go to Oregon in a covered wagon were Marcus and Narcissa Whitman who made the trip in 1836. But the big wave of western migration did not start until 1843, when about a thousand pioneers made the journey” (Intro. to Oregon Trail).
In 1843, wagon train pushed a massive move west on the Oregon Trail. Over the next twenty fives years more than a half million people went west on the Trail. Some went all the way to search for farmland. Many more visited California searching for gold. The glory years of the Oregon Trail finally ended in 1869, when the transcontinental railroad was completed.
Because of the war with Mexico during the year 1846 to 1848, United States in 1846 claimed the occupation of New Mexico as its territory the land between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande. Moreover, Upper California was first like a piece of mature fruit ready to fall from a tree, in addition with these reasons: the far distance from the central government in Mexico City and the province was populated by independent people. They obviously made some prominent native Californians believed their land would be better under control of the United States. Therefore, the California State came to the union officially at the same time as New Mexico by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo that ended the Mexican War in 1848.
The expansion to the west was brought by the railroad like the Oregon Trail that led people to settle in Oregon State. The other famous railroad that is another factor moving people to the west is the transcontinental railroad. “The idea of a transcontinental railroad across North America was first seriously pursued by the head engineer of the Sacramento Valley Railroad. One of the most difficult problems facing him was crossing the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The Rockies had several relatively easy passes through it. The Sierra Nevadas were relentless, however. Finally he came up with a route through the mountains” (Why was the railroad built?).
The Southern Pacific began laying tracks in Sacramento, California on January 8, 1863. It is know as the Central Pacific. The company headquarters were in Sacramento at the time. There was the Sierra Nevada Mountains with harsh winters was a tremendous obstacle. Tunnels were drilled and blasted through solid granite mountains. The main tunnel at Sierra summit was 1,659 feet long. Work on the tunnel took two years to complete. Once out of the mountains, the railroad made great time, one day laying over ten miles of track.
The Union Pacific Railroad started work three years after the Southern Pacific had started. However they had a longer way to go than the Southern Pacific because laying tracks across the flat plains went considerably faster than building bridges and blasting tunnels through the mountains.
Most workers on the Union Pacific were Irish immigrants. The Southern Pacific had mostly Chinese immigrants. It was rumored that the American workers got paid more than the immigrants, but this is false. Everyone got paid exactly a dollar a day.
On May 10, 1869 at Promontory Point, Utah the Central Pacific Railroad met the Union Pacific Railroad to complete the United States’ first transcontinental railroad. The train on the western track was headed by the Central Pacific’s Jupiter engine while the train on the eastern track was headed by the Union Pacific’s Engine Number 119. Early in the day, officials of both railroads along with their guests had descended from the private cars behind the engines. An army detachment cleared the crowd so that the guests and speakers could make their way to the site. The entire nation waited with parades and ceremonies for those three dots. Leland Stanford, the Governor of California and one of the four heads of the Central Pacific Railroad, raised the hammer to drive last spike. Also with him was Dr. Thomas Durant, the Vice President of the Union Pacific. Stanford swung at the spike first and missed. Then Durant swung and missed. The telegrapher tapped the three dots anyway, moments before the Union Pacific's chief engineer drove the golden spike. Engine 119 and the Jupiter inched forward until they gently touched each other. The engineers of the trains broke champagne on each other’s engine. After a series of speeches an elaborate lunch was served on Governor Stanford's private car for all the dignitaries while the crowd ate buffalo humps and drank whiskey all provided by the Central Pacific. As dusk fell, the two special trains backed away from each other. The Jupiter headed to San Francisco and the Number 119 went to New York. That night a torchlight parade, a banquet, and a grand ball were held at Promontory Point.
Since then, the transcontinental rail road made the rate of immigration to the west increase. People started to move west in order to find new land and resources. Also, people around the world started to move and settle in United States mostly along the west coast. Chinese, Japanese, all kind s of European people were easily found in the western states, especially California. Many famous occasions occurred in the west, such as the story about the California gold rush, the rumor about the white people versus the Indians, and so forth. All of these things in the west made America a complete nation like today.
If American people along the east coast never expanded its nation to the west, there would now not be the powerful nation called the United States of America like today. “Melting-pot,” or the phrase that obviously stereotypes the American nation, caused by this expansion to the west. Cultures and population were brought. Finally, it all made America complete America.
