How was the Transcontinental Railroad funded yawp?

The 1862 Pacific Railroad Act gave bonds of between $16,000 and $48,000 for each mile of construction and provided vast land grants to railroad companies. Between 1850 and 1871 alone, railroad companies received more than 175,000,000 acres of public land, an area larger than the state of Texas.



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Receiving millions of acres of public lands from Congress, the railroads were assured land on which to lay the tracks and land to sell, the proceeds of which helped companies finance the construction of their railroads.

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In 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railway Act, which designated the 32nd parallel as the initial transcontinental route, and provided government bonds to fund the project and large grants of lands for rights-of-way.

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By one estimate, the project cost roughly $60 million, about $1.2 billion in today's money, though other sources put the amount even higher. While the railroad's construction was a mammoth undertaking, its effects on the country were equally profound.

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The line from San Francisco, California, to Toledo, Ohio, was completed in 1909, consisting of the Western Pacific Railway, Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, Missouri Pacific Railroad, and Wabash Railroad.

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