Gordon H. Chang is the author of the new book Ghosts of Gold Mountain: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad. His other books include Fateful Ties and The Chinese and the Iron Road. He is the Olive H. Palmer Professor in Humanities and Professor of History at Stanford University, and he lives in Stanford, California.
Q: Why did you decide to focus your new book on the Chinese
workers who built the transcontinental railroad?
A: I am a fourth-generation Chinese American who grew up in
California hearing about the Chinese railroad workers but never with any
detail. Their story has been a lifelong curiosity and I tried to gather
documentation about their past over the years but with little success. Now,
late in my career, I have had the time and resources to devote to the recovery
of their history.
Q: You write, "Though difficult, a recovery of a lost
past is possible if imaginative efforts are made to understand the rich and
expansive historical materials that do exist." How did you research the
book, and did you learn anything that particularly surprised you?
A: Almost everything was a surprise; the numbers, their centrality
to the construction effort; the way they lived their daily lives; the insult as
well as honor they received from white society. I also learned new ways to do
history if we have a paucity of direct evidence, as we do with the Chinese
railroad workers. We need to be resourceful and imaginative.
Q: Why did so many immigrants from China end up working on
the railroads, and what paths did they tend to take later in life?
A: Railroads in America hired tens of thousands of workers
and the Chinese distinguished themselves as bring expert and capable workers.
After the completion of the transcontinental, local and regional railroad companies
around the country recruited them for work. Many continued to work for railroad
companies for decades afterwards; others took the opportunity afforded by the
railroad to travel around the country. They established communities in rural
and urban areas from the Rocky Mountain states to the Eastern Seaboard and even
the Deep South.
Q: What do you see as these workers' legacy today?
A: Many Chinese communities today are directly linked to
these railroad workers but as for a larger legacy, one needs to acknowledge
that modern, industrial America owes a great deal to the work of the Chinese on
completing the first transcontinental. Without them, the line would not have
been completed until many years later.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I continue to work on the history of the Chinese railroad
workers. Ghosts of Gold Moutain and The Chinese and the Iron Road have
stimulated great public interest and readers continue to send me information to
supplement what is in the books.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: I appreciate the attention and interest and encourage all
to help recover history: There is so much to learn!
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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