asa whitney came up with the idea to build the transcontinental railroad and did much of the land survey work for determining the best route over the sierra nevada.
asa whitney came up with the idea to build the transcontinental railroad and did much of the land survey work for determining the best route over the sierra nevada.
who came up with the idea to build the transcontinental railroad and did much of the land survey work for determining the best route over the sierra nevada?
asa whitney
theodore judah









































theodore dehone judah (march 4, 1826 – november 2, 1863) was an american railroad and civil engineer who was a central figure in the original promotion, establishment, and design of the first transcontinental railroad. he found investors for what became the central pacific railroad (cprr). as chief engineer, he performed much of the land survey work to determine the best route for the railroad over the sierra nevada mountains.









































section::::early life and education.
theodore judah
montague was appointed chief engineer of the central pacific railroad in 1863 after the death of theodore judah. he was responsible for building the western half of the first transcontinental railroad. he was a confidant of leland stanford the founder of stanford university, governor of california and one of the "big four" who directed the central pacific railroad. samuel was one of stanford's "inner circle". he was the engineer charged with directing the locating, designing and building the western section of the transcontinental railroad that linked the west and east coasts of the united states, that linked promontory summit, utah, to sacramento, california. montague was assisted by his fellow engineers lewis m. clement and james harvey strobridge. montague directed the engineering work on the central pacific which involved the work of thousands of chinese as well as their "white" surveyors, engineers, coordinators, supervisors, etc. as they crossed the sierra nevada over donner pass. it was a monumental engineering undertaking. in the famous "golden spike" celebration photo of 1869 in which a central pacific locomotive and a union pacific locomotive are touching "nose-to-nose" at promontory, utah. the two men shaking hands at the center of this photograph are samuel s. montague chief engineer for the central pacific and grenville m. dodge, chief engineer for the union pacific. samuel in about 1869 became one of eight officers of the central pacific railroad. in addition to the transcontinental railroad, he was chief engineer during the construction of numerous other railroad lines in california that central pacific and later the expanded southern pacific railroad continued to build.
samuel s. montague