Fascinating and colorful history of the construction and running of the Sunset Route which took passengers from New York to New Orleans by steamship and then by rail (Central Pacific and Southern Pacific) to San Francisco. Filled with timetables, maps, milepost stories of cities along the route, statistics, views of the ferryboats, steamers and freight trains, the open air cars as well as the elegant Pullmans, equipment diagrams, and many full color, full page advertisements. It even reproduces some of the playing cards used on the route. Settle in for a trip aboard the Sunset Limited!
Excerpt from Introduction:
With the cry of "gold" heard throughout the land in 1849, the seekers of fortune were soon lashing up their covered wagons for the trek West or booking passage on the Clipper ships sailing around the Horn to the Golden State - California.
The wagon roads with their trials and tributions were many, but they came by the thousands. Just 20 years later the Gold Spike was driven at Promontory, Utah, and the Central Pacific locomotive "Jupiter" nudged the pilot of Union Pacific No. 119, the transcontinental railroad link across the United States had been completed.
The development of railroads in the Far West continued at a rapid pace. By the turn of the century, the Southern Pacific (which had taken over the Central Pacific) had thousands of miles of rail in place and had established four Gateways to the Pacific Coast: Overland Route, Shasta Route, Sunset Route and Golden State Route, along with numerous branch lines that fanned out into agriculture, lumber and mining areas. To give impetus of coast to coast service, a steamship service was established from New Orleans, the easternmost point on the railroad, to New York.