Frontier Fighters Directed by Directed by Directed by Music by Directed by Music by Music by Directed by Music by to yeah here l Frontier fighters, devoted sons and ardent champions of those daring deeds which brought fame and fortune to the West. One of the most thrilling epochs in the history of the West and Southwest was the magnificent achievement of spanning the continent by the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific Railroads. Behind this great epic feat, there was a pitched battle of men, fighting feverishly against time, the elements and Indians. And for the formative years, this great saga of sweat and steel was boisterously chanted against the background of the Civil War. One night, before the fall of Vicksburg, Colonel Grenville Dodge was suddenly ordered to Washington. The business was marked urgent. The signature was that of Abraham Lincoln. The President remarks to his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, Mary, I've sent for Grenville Dodge. Aren't there enough men in Washington to advise you about the Union Pacific Railroad? Yes, Mary, but they're not honest men. Under the Railroad Act of 1862, we can start building now. They have in California. We have them here because every congressman wants the railroad to start in his state. If it were small enough, he'd like to have it puff out right from his own backyard. Oh, Abe Lincoln, how can you keep on joking when you've got a war and a transcontinental railroad on your hands? They're not on my hands, Mary, in my hands. The Civil War in my right hand and a transcontinental railroad in my left. And I guess I'll manage to juggle them both. Oh. Colonel Dodge, first appointment, Mr. President. Oh, yeah, I'll see him. Mary, Nitten and war go together, but not Nitten and railroads. I had no intention of staying, Abram. To span a continent and bring the people of the West face to face with the people of the East. Mr. President. Come in, Dodge, come in, come in. Mr. President. Dodge, I called you to the White House because you're an honest man, that's first. Second, because you know about railroads. I'm honored, sir. By the Act of 1862, Congress gives me the power to authorize the building of a railroad. A company is formed known as the Union Pacific. They're waiting only for one thing, an approved starting point and government money. Mr. President, suppose I furnish the money and you furnish the starting point. Yeah. Seriously, Dodge, the issue is this. Oh, pull up a chair. Don't be so formal. Thank you, sir. California already is broken ground for the Central Pacific. We're still waiting. The money crowd are lobbying for Omaha as a terminal. Of course, they want to serve themselves. I want to serve the nation. You can serve the nation best, Mr. President, by breaking ground at Council Bluffs, Iowa. If you'll step to this map, sir. Mm-hmm. That is strategic. This is the way the route should go, starting here and possibly meeting with the Central Pacific in Utah. That's a great stretch of country. Planes, desert, mountains. You'll need an army of workers, Mr. President, to build the railroad and an army of soldiers to protect the workers. Well, Dodge, when do you think this work should start? Right now, sir. That's the way I feel about it. If I can just live to see the war brought to a just and righteous end and this railroad underway. Why, Mr. President, you live to drive the golden spike in the last railroad tie connecting East and West. And no man lives longer than he should. And there's no exception to the rule. Be the man a rail splitter or president. I'll start the work, Dodge, but when the war is over, I want you to finish it. And so with the nation torn by a war that threatened her very existence, this vision, which farsighted men had had for more than a quarter of a century, began. Feverishly, thousands of men worked under the burning sun of summer and the rain, snow, and stinging sleet of winter. Worked, sweated, swore, but drove on. Millions of government money more than matched millions of private capital. Out of the gloom and suspicion which shrouded the early years emerged hope and optimism and faith. Hundreds of miles of tracks had been laid, both in the East and the West. The war was drawing to a close. Then, suddenly came the day. The war was over. In the West, Leland Stanford, inspiration of the Central Pacific, said, I say that every man who lays down his musket should pick up a shovel, an axe, and a hammer, and work for the railroad. The destiny of the West lies in the East, and the destiny of the East in the West. Godspeed the day when men and women in the East, the West, the North, and the South, shall stand shoulder to shoulder and heart to heart. Not as rebels or Yankees, but once again as Americans. The nation rejoiced at the end of the conflict, and speedily began the work of reconstruction. Then, as suddenly as a bolt leaves the blue, the telegraph, which went hand in hand with every mile of railroad, ticked out this horrible news. Important dispatch men, hold your work. What's it all about, Bill? It's about old Abe. Has he asked Congress to vote us a bonus? Well, Bill, what was the message? Bill, what's come over you? Bill! God have mercy on all of us. God have mercy. They've gone out and shot old Abe. What shot Abe? Shot old Abe? Bill, it can't be. Poor old Abe. An act by the name of Booth in Ford's theater shot him dead. For the next week, after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, chaos was king. The alarmists predicted the railroads would be abandoned. Those who wanted to hold back the march of progress said it was the will of God. The Almighty had stepped in and stopped such wickedness. Then, Andrew Johnson took the oath of office and called for Dremble Dodge, now a general, and sent him directly to the Indian country. This was the first order Dodge telegraph to all district commanders on the plane. Place every mounted man in your command on the south flat route. Prepare telegraph lines. Attack all bodies of hostile Indians. Stay with them and pound them until they move north of the Platte or south of the Arkansas. I am coming with two regiments of cavalry to the Platte line and will open and protect it. But it was one thing to give an order on the planes in 65 and another to see that it was carried out. Late in July, 2,000 Indians of different tribes launched a campaign to destroy all telegraph stations along the Platte. In August, matters reached a crisis. The government, its army reduced to peacetime strength again, was faced with the problem of going on or backing out. To control the Indians, a new army of 22,000 men was needed and $50 million to finance such a campaign. The treasury was almost depleted, yet the railroads called for more government money and the immigrant trains called for protection. General Dodge, intent on a solution of the problem, took a small company of mounted soldiers and went into the heart of the Indian country. General, is this a scouting expedition or just what is it? I'm looking for two things, Pelliday. Where all these surprise attacks come from, also for some undiscovered paths through which the railroad might go down into the Laramie Plains without so much grain. Well, you certainly picture the smallest trooper men could want to risk a pitch battle with. Pelliday, I'm not looking for a fight today. Oh, they're whole. Well, it looks like you'll have it anyway. Indians and a lot of them. Give me those glasses. Crows. How many? About 300. You think they see us? No doubt they followed us all day and aimed to close in at night. Dismount! Dismount! Dismount! Climb up to the top of this ridge! Yes, sir! Yes, sir! We're fired on. We'll return the fire immediately. Start signal fires, which our regiment will see. Look, the crows have just mounted now. They're starting to scale the mountains to cut off retreat either north or south. All right. We're high enough for the fires and there's plenty of fuel here. Start the signal fires! Yes, sir! Indians coming closer. Six of you men, start picking them off. Fires going, sir. Let them have a volley of through. Good! All right, men. Let them have a volley! Yes, sir. Yes, sir. We'll pick up one or two of them both themselves. More people's rising, sir. We're no large. Good! We should have an answering signal before long. More crows scaling the mountains here. A volley of them direction, men. Our camp's answering, sir. They're coming! There they go, General. Every last crow is backing up and hightailing it for hold. They saw the answering smoke signals through from our camp. Hold your fire now, men! Yes, sir! Tell me, I've been so busy looking straight ahead and to the left, I never thought to look to the right. See that slope going down so gently to the plain? Yeah. I think we've discovered a path through which we can build the Union Pacific into Laramie. I wonder where that slope goes to. It seems to me it slopes down to a crick bed. Must be a grade of less than 100 feet to the mile. Clem, Jim, you keep a look out here. Yes, sir. Rest of you fellows, mount off and follow me. I think we've made a real fight this time. General Dodge made a discovery that is part of the history of the Union Pacific. He took back to Washington the discovery of this new path and the plan of action to put down the Indians. Both were bitterly fought. But in the end he won. The years, good and bad, fraught with victory and with defeat, rolled on. And then came that historic day, May 10, 1869. The last rail was ready to be laid and the last spike to be driven. A Union Pacific steam monster driven from the east was almost chugging in the face of one driven from the west. The meeting place was Promontory Point, Utah. Now the last rail was laid and three spikes were to be driven. One gold from California. A silver spike from Nevada. And an iron spike from the east. A telegraph line attached to the silver hammer used to drive the spikes was wired to a telegraph instrument. And the thrilling news was carried to the nation. The transcontinental railroad had at last become a reality and the nation was welded into a stronger, more indissolvable union. This was as Leland Stanford had predicted in 1862. The day when men and women in the east, the west, the north and the south shall stand shoulder to shoulder and heart to heart, not as rebels or Yankees, but once again as Americans. And so another chapter has been written in the lives of frontier fighters. The End
