Filth of Progress: Immigrants, Americans, and the Building of Canals and Railroads in the West - Softcover

Dearinger, Ryan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0520284607 ISBN 13: 9780520284609

Verlag: University of California Press, 2015

Inhaltsangabe

The Filth of Progress explores the untold side of a well-known American story. For more than a century, accounts of progress in the West foregrounded the technological feats performed while canals and railroads were built and lionized the capitalists who financed the projects. This book salvages stories often omitted from the triumphant narrative of progress by focusing on the suffering and survival of the workers who were treated as outsiders. Ryan Dearinger examines the moving frontiers of canal and railroad construction workers in the tumultuous years of American expansion, from the completion of the Erie Canal in 1825 to the joining of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroads in 1869. He tells the story of the immigrants and Americans—the Irish, Chinese, Mormons, and native-born citizens—whose labor created the West’s infrastructure and turned the nation’s dreams of a continental empire into a reality. Dearinger reveals that canals and railroads were not static monuments to progress but moving spaces of conflict and contestation.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Ryan Dearinger is Associate Professor of History at Eastern Oregon University.

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"The Filth of Progress persuasively outlines the dark underbelly of the much-celebrated 'progress' that transportation improvements wrought between the 1820s and 1870s. Dearinger skillfully brings together the histories of Irish immigrants, Mormons, and Chinese workers. This compact, vividly written book will be of benefit to students and scholars of U.S. labor history, U.S. immigration history, and the history of the American West."—Thomas G. Andrews, Associate Professor of History at the University of Colorado and author of Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War and Coyote Valley: Deep History in the High Rockies

"The Filth of Progress unmasks the strangely neglected work and self-advocacy of immigrant and Mormon transportation workers in the building of the American West. Dearinger’s clear and polished prose reveals the commonalties and differences in how diverse workers tried to better their lives and conditions. This book will appeal to western historians, cultural historians of nineteenth-century American 'improvement' and 'progress,' labor historians, and historians of immigration."—Katherine Benton-Cohen, Associate Professor of History at Georgetown University and author of Borderline Americans: Racial Division and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands

"Just twenty years ago Peter Way introduced American historians to the harrowing lives of the 'navvies' working on New York’s Erie Canal. Now Ryan Dearinger offers a rich, new, up-to-date study of the hard-working armies of laborers who dug the canals and spiked the rails that eventually knit together a transcontinental United States. The Filth of Progress deftly links the cultural enthusiasm for technology and development with the enormous suffering wrung from the hands and backs of thousands of marginalized persons from the opening of the Erie through the celebratory Golden Spike nearly half a century later. Irish immigrants, Mormons, and contract Chinese laborers—each group held in some degree of contempt by 'free' and 'white' Americans—greased the skids of progress with their sweat and blood. Familiar racial and ethnic hostilities, rank exploitation, and shameless manipulations ornament the story; but lest we forgive the principles for the 'standards of the day,' Dearinger displays one after another the outrageous fictions concocted to fix blame on the victims after the fact. Americans not only did not build their greatest achievement themselves, they lied aggressively to rob those who did of any scrap of credit or dignity. Not an uplifting story, Dearinger’s account helps to balance scales too long tipped in the direction of bloodless triumph and Yankee ingenuity. Read ’em, and weep."—John Lauritz Larson, Professor of History at Purdue University and author of The Market Revolution in America: Liberty, Ambition, and the Eclipse of the Common Good

Aus dem Klappentext

"The Filth of Progress persuasively outlines the dark underbelly of the much-celebrated 'progress' that transportation improvements wrought between the 1820s and 1870s. Dearinger skillfully brings together the histories of Irish immigrants, Mormons, and Chinese workers. This compact, vividly written book will be of benefit to students and scholars of U.S. labor history, U.S. immigration history, and the history of the American West."—Thomas G. Andrews, Associate Professor of History at the University of Colorado and author of Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War and Coyote Valley: Deep History in the High Rockies

"The Filth of Progress unmasks the strangely neglected work and self-advocacy of immigrant and Mormon transportation workers in the building of the American West. Dearinger’s clear and polished prose reveals the commonalties and differences in how diverse workers tried to better their lives and conditions. This book will appeal to western historians, cultural historians of nineteenth-century American 'improvement' and 'progress,' labor historians, and historians of immigration."—Katherine Benton-Cohen, Associate Professor of History at Georgetown University and author of Borderline Americans: Racial Division and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands

"Just twenty years ago Peter Way introduced American historians to the harrowing lives of the 'navvies' working on New York’s Erie Canal. Now Ryan Dearinger offers a rich, new, up-to-date study of the hard-working armies of laborers who dug the canals and spiked the rails that eventually knit together a transcontinental United States. The Filth of Progress deftly links the cultural enthusiasm for technology and development with the enormous suffering wrung from the hands and backs of thousands of marginalized persons from the opening of the Erie through the celebratory Golden Spike nearly half a century later. Irish immigrants, Mormons, and contract Chinese laborers—each group held in some degree of contempt by 'free' and 'white' Americans—greased the skids of progress with their sweat and blood. Familiar racial and ethnic hostilities, rank exploitation, and shameless manipulations ornament the story; but lest we forgive the principles for the 'standards of the day,' Dearinger displays one after another the outrageous fictions concocted to fix blame on the victims after the fact. Americans not only did not build their greatest achievement themselves, they lied aggressively to rob those who did of any scrap of credit or dignity. Not an uplifting story, Dearinger’s account helps to balance scales too long tipped in the direction of bloodless triumph and Yankee ingenuity. Read ’em, and weep."—John Lauritz Larson, Professor of History at Purdue University and author of The Market Revolution in America: Liberty, Ambition, and the Eclipse of the Common Good

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The Filth of Progress

Immigrants, Americans, and the Building of Canals and Railroads in the West

By Ryan Dearinger

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

Copyright © 2016 The Regents of the University of California
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-520-28460-9

Contents

List of Illustrations, xi, 
Acknowledgments, xiii, 
1 • "Bind the Republic Together": Canals, Railroads, and the Paradox of American Progress, 1, 
2 • "A Wretched and Miserable Condition": Irish Ditchdiggers, the Triumph of Progress, and the Contest of Canal Communities in the Hoosier State, 16, 
3 • "Abuse of the Labour and Lives of Men": Irish Construction Workers and the Violence of Progress on the Illinois Transportation Frontier, 57, 
4 • "Hell (and Heaven) on Wheels": Mormons, Immigrants, and the Reconstruction of American Progress and Masculinity on the Transcontinental Railroad, 107, 
5 • "The Greatest Monument of Human Labor": Chinese Immigrants, the Landscape of Progress, and the Work of Building and Celebrating the Transcontinental Railroad, 151, 
6 • End-of-Track: Reflections on the History of Immigrant Labor and American Progress, 188, 
Notes, 203, 
Bibliography, 251, 
Index, 277, 

CHAPTER 1

"Bind the Republic Together"

CANALS, RAILROADS, AND THE PARADOX OF AMERICAN PROGRESS

Let us bind the Republic together with a perfect system of roads and canals.... Let us conquer space.

JOHN C. CALHOUN, 1817

THE STORY OF CANALS AND railroads, westward expansion, and national progress holds an enduring place in the pageant of American history. In many respects, canals and railroads were the ultimate technologies and symbols of nineteenth-century America. The building of these early "internal improvements" promised the triumph of U.S. labor and manhood over wilderness, distance, and time. Nothing better symbolized this march toward the future than the jubilant May 1869 Golden Spike celebration at Promontory Summit, Utah, which marked the joining of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroads. While this event honored one of America's greatest technological achievements, numerous lesser-known celebrations both preceded and followed the triumphant transcontinental ceremony. As early as the 1825 completion of the Erie Canal, Americans envisioned internal improvements as the key to progress and distinctiveness. When subsequent canals, turnpikes, and railroads reified these dreams of progress, Americans interpreted such improvements as the inevitable "blessings of liberty" writ large. Canal and railroad company officials, politicians, religious leaders, and journalists were even bolder in their predictions of continued progress. More than merely enhancing the wealth and reputation of the nation, they argued, internal improvement projects would "bind the republic together," eliminate sectional differences, transform America into a powerful continental empire, and raise up God's kingdom on earth.

Nineteenth-century Americans of every background considered the process of western expansion as one of the country's foundational experiences, as instrumental as the American Revolution in shaping a national identity and charting a course for the future. Transportation projects simultaneously accelerated and validated such expansion, helping naturalize it as uniquely American. Thus, canals and railroads made the West a moving epicenter of progress; the cloud of dust, ripple of a current, puff of steam, and the transit of goods and people became its most visible manifestations.

In America's historical imagination, toil and triumph against nature and overwhelming odds characterizes such achievements as the Erie Canal and the transcontinental railroad. America's debt to the perceived architects of these technological marvels was great. Triumph transformed canal and railroad entrepreneurs into visionaries whose work brought the nation bountiful riches and did the Lord's bidding. Celebrated for their spirit and perseverance in "building" the nation's infrastructure, they found respect for looking to tomorrow and creating a future. Mountains named in their honor and statues raised in towns were fitting tributes to their patriotic efforts. For generations, most indexes of American history supported and reinforced this narrative of progress.

Yet, if this is the historical memory, it is conveniently stunted. What of those whose bodies strained and broke under the load of such glories? What of those men beyond the din and fanfare who appear only in old photographs with faces blurred and indistinguishable? In their lives and deaths in the mud, muck, and mountains is another history of American achievement. These barely visible and forgotten, ordinary men, "unskilled" immigrants from Ireland and China, Mormons, and native-born American workingmen rank, as well, as the creators of national growth and progress. Their experiences and voices, along with those of the privileged and well connected, are the subjects of this study. I examine the rise of western canals and railroads to national prominence through the menial labor of countless men, largely hidden from view because they left virtually no paper trail, who strung together livelihoods at the economic fringes of society. These men both endured and shaped the dark underbelly of progress. This book examines the contest for control of American progress and history as distilled from the competing narratives of canal and railroad construction workers and those fortunate enough to avoid this fate.

The idea of progress was imperative to Americans in the expansion-minded nineteenth century. Yet the right stuff of labor had to be consistent with the national imagination. Early nineteenth-century supporters of internal improvements praised a labor force composed of virtuous, American-born small farmers who worked overtime to build canals and railroads during lulls in the agricultural cycle. But such part-time digging and tracklaying had proven insufficient for projects that sought to promote the "general utility." Moreover, no one wanted to imagine a class of independent American men relegated to the status of ditchdiggers. For those deemed closest to God because of their nearness to his fertile soil, the brutish labor of digging ditches and laying track could only deny farmers both their independent status and holy calling. Early nineteenth-century American values suggested that republican "free men" were beholden to no one, and only independent adult white males who produced for themselves and their kin qualified for political manhood.

The fact that northern and western states gradually relaxed property qualifications for suffrage by the time the Erie Canal was under construction did not diminish an earlier conception of citizenship, standing, and even personhood that distanced menial laborers, and particularly immigrants, from the American ideal, regardless of the work in which they were engaged. Scholarship on nineteenth-century political theories, namely classical liberalism and republicanism, has exposed the hypocrisy inherent in laws regulating citizenship at the state and national level. Just as universal manhood suffrage replaced property ownership as the litmus test for voting rights, forms of second-class citizenship emerged, denying personal liberties and opportunities for political participation on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, and gender. States went so far as to insert the word "white" into statutes governing voting rights. At the same time, forms of civic inequality and national identity took...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: University of California Press
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2015
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0520284607
• ISBN 13: 9780520284609
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 310
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchbär; info@buchbaer.de; ; Weberstr. 67; Osnabrück; 49084; Deutschland