August 17, 2025 - Golden Spike National Historic Site
The Locomotives
Behind the Visitors Center is the highlight of the visit: the actual site where the Union Pacific and Central Pacific rails were joined.  Flanking the site are functioning replicas of the two steam-powered locomotives that were there for the joining ceremony on May 10, 1869.
   
On the left, representing the Central Pacific, is the "Jupiter".  On the right, representing the Union Pacific, is "Engine Number 119".  These are probably the two most famous steam engines in American history.
   
Normally, the locomotives chugg out of their maintenance barn at 12 noon.  They go back in starting at 4 PM.  We weren't able to get here until 1PM so we missed the staging evolution.  But we did see them get underway starting at 4PM.
   
Looking east down the tracks.
   

A good look at the Central Pacific "Jupiter".

The Jupiter was Central Pacific locomotive No. 60, built by the Schenectady Locomotive Works in New York in September 1868. It was a classic American 4-4-0—four leading wheels and four driving wheels, with no trailing truck. This was the standard locomotive configuration of the era.

What's remarkable is how far it traveled just to get to California.  The Central Pacific had the locomotives dismantled, shipped by sea around Cape Horn, then brought up the Sacramento River by barge. Jupiter was reassembled in Sacramento and entered service on March 20, 1869, less than two months before the Golden Spike ceremony.

Jupiter wasn't supposed to be the ceremonial locomotive.  Leland Stanford's special train originally was supposed to be pulled by another Central Pacific locomotive, Antelope.  But while the special was approaching Promontory, Antelope ran into an unfortunate accident. A work crew was clearing a mountain cut and apparently didn't notice the small green flag on the preceding train indicating that another train was following. They rolled a large log down onto the track.  Antelope hit it.  The locomotive wasn't derailed, but it was damaged badly enough that Stanford's train had to find another engine.   That engine was Jupiter.
   

And the Union Pacific's "Number 119".

No. 119 was also a 4-4-0, built by Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works of Paterson, New Jersey, in November 1868. It was one of a group of five locomotives—Nos. 116 through 120—built for Union Pacific.

It too wasn't originally supposed to be the famous engine.  Union Pacific Vice President Thomas Durant had his own special train headed toward Promontory. But the trip turned into something of a fiasco.  First, at Piedmont, Wyoming, more than 400 railroad tie cutters stopped Durant's train because they hadn't been paid. They effectively held his train hostage for almost two days.  Then, when the train finally reached the Devil's Gate Bridge over the Weber River, heavy flooding had damaged the bridge supports. Durant's engineer refused to put the heavy locomotive across it.  Instead, he pushed the passenger cars across the bridge one at a time.  That left Durant on the far side without a locomotive.  A telegraph message went to Ogden requesting a rescue engine. The locomotive sitting conveniently next to the main line was No. 119.
   
A replica of the specially prepared California laurelwood tie where the Golden Spike was driven.
   
Engraved plate on the last tie.
   
Standing in front of No. 119's control room.
   
Union Pacific's No. 119 burned coal to convert water into steam.  Wood was not available across the Great Plains so the engines used coal.
   
 
   
 
   

Were the locomotives really this beautifully decorated back in the day?  Apparently they were.  People today tend to imagine 19th-century locomotives as grimy black machines. In reality, locomotives in the 1860s were often highly ornamented. Railroads regarded them as both working machinery and rolling advertising.
   

 Now checking out the Jupiter.
   
The Jupiter was operated by the engineer and fireman from this little control room.
   
As you can see here, unlike the coal-burning No. 119, the Jupiter burns wood, which was plentiful in the Sierra Nevadas.
   
Waiting for the train!
   
Lynnette surveys a wagon of old railroad ties.
   
The National Park Ranger gave a short talk before the locomotives got underway.
   

After their famous day, neither locomotive was preserved.

Jupiter continued working for Central Pacific and later Southern Pacific. It underwent so many modifications that it eventually bore little resemblance to the locomotive that appeared at Promontory.  In 1891 it became Southern Pacific No. 1195, and in 1893 it was converted from wood to coal burning.  It was eventually sold to the Gila Valley, Globe and Northern Railroad, where it became their No. 1.  Despite attempts by its last engineer to save it, the old Jupiter was eventually sold for scrap.

No. 119 continued working for Union Pacific as a freight locomotive. In 1882 it was renumbered No. 343.  Like Jupiter, it eventually became obsolete and was scrapped.

The National Park Service says the two locomotives ultimately brought their owners roughly $1,000 each in scrap value—an almost unbelievable fate for engines that had once been the centerpieces of one of the most famous events in American history
   

.In 1975, O'Connor Engineering Laboratories of Costa Mesa, California, took on the job of recreating both locomotives.

They had no original construction drawings or blueprints.  Instead, the engineers used surviving photographs of the originals, measurements scaled from those photographs, a locomotive design handbook from 1870, and
engineering detective work.  They produced more than 700 drawings during the project.

The finished locomotives were accurate to approximately ¼ inch in their dimensions. They were completed in 1979 and commissioned at Promontory on the 110th anniversary, May 10, 1979.

These aren't static museum props. They're real, operating steam locomotives.

It was really quite something for me to see No. 119 cruise down the tracks under steam power.  Living history.
   
 
   
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