WEST WORDS

‘The greater portion of the laborers employed by us are Chinese, who constitute a large element in the population of California. Without them it would be impossible to complete the western portion of this great national enterprise within the time required by the acts of Congress. As a class they are quiet, peaceable, patient, industrious and economical. Ready and apt to learn all the different kinds of work required in railroad building, they soon become as efficient as white laborers’

—Central Pacific President Leland Stanford wrote this on Oct. 10, 1865, in a report to U.S. President Andrew