Contemporary Views Along the First Transcontinental Railroad

Abstract

Contemporary Views Along the First Transcontinental Railroad is a comprehensive series of photographs made along the original route of the Pacific Railroad. A pictorial accompaniment to well-established textual histories of the building of the railroad, such as David Haward Bain’s Empire Express, Koenig’s goal is to give the viewer as strong of a connection as possible to this historic 19th century engineering marvel through the remaining human-altered landscape. While no people appear in the images, Koenig hopes they conjure the Chinese and Irish graders who built the road, as well as Native Americans, who were so gravely affected by it.

From the author: This document contains portions of four issues of the Quarterly Newsletter, published by the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society. I was asked to supply images for the centerspread in four issues over the course of a year leading up to the sesquicentennial of the Golden Spike. I have included the cover of each issue, my preliminary page (with map and captions), followed by the centerspread (each with two of my landscape photographs).

Includes Quarterly Newsletters Volume 38, Number 2 (Summer 2018); Volume 38, Number 3 (Fall 2018); Volume 38, Number 4 (Winter 2018); and Volume 39, Number 1 (Spring 2019)

Reproduced with permission of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society.