Richard Braden

Promontory: [the Golden Spike, 1869] Richard Braden

This novel is historical fiction, written for teenagers and young adults who like to ready about history, but not in history books. This is the story of the Central Pacific Railroad of California, as told by two young men in the employ of the "Big Four" (Leland Stanford, Collis Huntington, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker), beginning in the later fall of 1861. The story goes far past the magical "Promontory, Utah" date in 1869 when the golden spike was driven to connect the Central Pacific Railroad of San Francisco/Sacramento with the Union Pacific Railroad of Omaha/Chicago. The "Big Four" and a lot of little people are followed as they proceed with the building of a railroad empire in the American West.