transcontinental railroad

Cultural  

1. A train route across the United States, finished in 1869. It was the project of two railroad companies: the Union Pacific built from the east, and the Central Pacific built from the west. The two lines met in Utah. The Central Pacific laborers were predominantly Chinese, and the Union Pacific laborers predominantly Irish. Both groups often worked under harsh conditions.

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Example Sentences

In July, Union Pacific agreed to buy Norfolk Southern for $72 billion, in a bid to create the first U.S. transcontinental railroad.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 31, 2025

The blockbuster railroad combination, the largest deal so far this year, would create the nation’s first transcontinental railroad operator.

From The Wall Street Journal • Sep. 20, 2025

The book falls short in its attempt to tie Yin Manor’s haunted nature to the exploitation of the thousands of Chinese migrants who built the Western half of the first transcontinental railroad, however.

From Los Angeles Times • May 2, 2025

Sacramento was the state’s first incorporated city and later became the western terminus of the transcontinental railroad.

From Washington Post • Apr. 17, 2023

If the building of the transcontinental railroad had served no other purpose, it had sent a steady stream of people away from the gold fields—a circumstance that made his mission seem all the more hopeless.

From Forty-one Thieves A Tale of California by Hall, Angelo