How did the transcontinental railroad transform California?
The transcontinental railroad was simple in conception, vast in scale and revolutionary in impact. It shortened the trip from New York to San Francisco from two months to four or five days and opened up markets on both coasts. Tracks were built simultaneously from the east and the west, eventually converging in Utah in 1869. The track going east from Sacramento was financed by the Central Pacific Railroad, which hired thousands of Chinese laborers to get the job done. One of its principals, Leland Stanford, became state governor in 1863. The Civil War (1861-65) slowed down the import of goods from the East Coast to California, thus spurring local industry to pick up the slack. Agriculture diversified, with new crops, especially oranges, being grown for export. As California oranges found their way onto New York grocery shelves, coupled with a hard-sell advertising campaign, more and more Easterners heeded the advice of crusading magazine and newspaper publisher Horace Greeley to `Go we
