Suggestions Please, what are these structures.

[JohnW.]

I can't find where I read it but I'm sure that I read that Chinese workers had to pay a tax to the railroad if they wanted to be accompanied by their families. I'm not sure how that works and why a tax would need to be paid, it seems to me that a family would suffer because the worker would be paid less, perhaps that's why the railroad companies introduced the tax, it would discourage the Chinese population from increasing in number.

with RR's like the Central Pacific etc...it was a love-hate relationship with the Chinese...they needed their help to lay the track desperately....but they discriminated, took advantage of, and just generally screwed them every chance that they could. Up to and including cold blooded murder. In Montana I lived not too awfully far from a site in Idaho that was the site of a massacre of coolies back in the 1870's or 1880's.

 

[diane]

Have you noticed how booms always seem to be strategically placed at cranium height.
And keeping us on track (excuse the pun) here some bright spark thought that railroad sailing would work. Here's a couple of picks taken of railroad sail thingy, there is one story of a railroad sail thingy reaching a speed of 20mph, all was well whilst the wind was abeam but when the wind changed direction, it blew the sail thingy of the rails along with its 15 passengers, as you can imagine it all resulted in a bit of a wreck, the handful of sailors that made up the crew were able to re-rig the sales and set off again.
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Source http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/sail/sail.htm

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Now that's clever. The greenies around here would LOVE it! But...what happens when you get becalmed? Everybody's got a harness under their seat?

 

[Waterloo50]

with RR's like the Central Pacific etc...it was a love-hate relationship with the Chinese...they needed their help to lay the track desperately....but they discriminated, took advantage of, and just generally screwed them every chance that they could. Up to and including cold blooded murder. In Montana I lived not too awfully far from a site in Idaho that was the site of a massacre of coolies back in the 1870's or 1880's.

I have heard of the massacre of Chinese miners at the hands of the white Union Pacific miners, in fact I think it was quite a common thing, Union Pacific for example were very good at preventing the white miners from forming Unions and protesting for better pay, you can see why these things happened, the railroad companies called the shots, if the white workers didn't knuckle down and accept low pay then all the railroad had to do was bring in cheaper labour (Chinese mostly) I guess that the white workers needed a scapegoat and cheap Chinese labour was the obvious target.

 

[Jimklag]

Now that's clever. The greenies around here would LOVE it! But...what happens when you get becalmed? Everybody's got a harness under their seat?

Harnesses or poles. I say yoke up those passengers and let 'em pull.

 

[Waterloo50]

Now that's clever. The greenies around here would LOVE it! But...what happens when you get becalmed? Everybody's got a harness under their seat?

They had thought of that, a team of horses would follow the sail things along the line.

 

[diane]

I have heard of the massacre of Chinese miners at the hands of the white Union Pacific miners, in fact I think it was quite a common thing, Union Pacific for example were very good at preventing the white miners from forming Unions and protesting for better pay, you can see why these things happened, the railroad companies called the shots, if the white workers didn't knuckle down and accept low pay then all the railroad had to do was bring in cheaper labour (Chinese mostly) I guess that the white workers needed a scapegoat and cheap Chinese labour was the obvious target.

It helps, too, if you're really, really different from somebody else! The Chinese weren't always that victimized, though. A good many of the railroad workers were hired by Chinese companies who provided the immigrants to American companies. They did the same with mining operations. In fact, that's where the long tom method of placer mining came from. The Chinese would dig a ditch, which used less water - California is full of Chinaman ditches. (Sorry - that's what they call them!)

 

[diane]

They had thought of that, a team of horses would follow the sail things along the line.

That's right! They used to use them over the Siskiyou Pass when the snow and ice got too much for the engine. Why, they still use them today - if you get your semi-truck into the ditch, get some horses!

 

[Waterloo50]

I have to be hone

That's right! They used to use them over the Siskiyou Pass when the snow and ice got too much for the engine. Why, they still use them today - if you get your semi-truck into the ditch, get some horses!

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I have to be honest, I know very little about horses, I do know a little bit about Shire horses, (don't know what you call them in the USA) but in the picture you posted they look like Shire's. The Shire horses in Britain are the heavy haulers, they were used to pull canal barges, broken down steam plough engines, in fact those horses could move mountains.

 

[diane]

I have to be hone

I have to be honest, I know very little about horses, I do know a little bit about Shire horses, (don't know what you call them in the USA) but in the picture you posted they look like Shire's. The Shire horses in Britain are the heavy haulers, they were used to pull canal barges, broken down steam plough engines, in fact those horses could move mountains.
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Those in the picture are Amish draft horses, very like the Shire horse. My ancestors from Kentucky were horse breeders - the war pretty much demolished their racing and saddle horse breeds - but when they arrived in Gold Country in California they took to breeding draft horses. I'm not sure what type my great-grandfather raised but they were used for mining operations and lumber mainly. There's still a section in the rodeos for draft horse competitions - those critters can HAUL!

 

[AndyHall]

This is a reconstructed dormitory car from the AMC series "Hell on Wheels," set during the construction of the U.S. Transcontinental Railroad in the late 1860s. Note the tie-downs to keep it from blowing over in a crosswind.

 

[Waterloo50]

This is a reconstructed dormitory car from the AMC series "Hell on Wheels."

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That's incredible, they did a fantastic job, I thought that I was looking at the original photo.

 

[Jimklag]

This is a reconstructed dormitory car from the AMC series "Hell on Wheels," set during the construction of the U.S. Transcontinental Railroad in the late 1860s. Note the tie-downs to keep it from blowing over in a crosswind.

View attachment 164378

Very cool.

 

[Waterloo50]

Its worth putting the two together for comparison.