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Sunset Limited: The Southern Pacific Railroad and the Development of the American West, 1850-1930
The only major U.S. railroad to be operated by westerners and the only railroad built from west to east, the Southern Pacific acquired a unique history and character. It also acquired a reputation, especially in California, as a railroad that people loved to hate. This magisterial history tells the full story of the Southern Pacific for the first time, shattering myths about the company that have prevailed to this day. A landmark account, Sunset Limited explores the railroad's development and influence—especially as it affected land settlement, agriculture, water policy, and the environment—and offers a new perspective on the tremendous, often surprising, role the company played in shaping the American West.
Based on his unprecedented and extensive research into the company's historical archives, Richard Orsi finds that, contrary to conventional understanding, the Southern Pacific Company identified its corporate well-being with population growth and social and economic development in the railroad's hinterland. As he traces the complex and shifting intersections between corporate and public interest, Orsi documents the railroad's little-known promotion of land distribution, small-scale farming, scientific agriculture, and less wasteful environmental practices and policies—including water conservation and wilderness and recreational parklands preservation.
Meticulously researched, lucidly written, and judiciously balanced, Sunset Limited opens a new window onto the American West in a crucial phase of its development and will forever change our perceptions of one of the largest and most important western corporations in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Based on his unprecedented and extensive research into the company's historical archives, Richard Orsi finds that, contrary to conventional understanding, the Southern Pacific Company identified its corporate well-being with population growth and social and economic development in the railroad's hinterland. As he traces the complex and shifting intersections between corporate and public interest, Orsi documents the railroad's little-known promotion of land distribution, small-scale farming, scientific agriculture, and less wasteful environmental practices and policies—including water conservation and wilderness and recreational parklands preservation.
Meticulously researched, lucidly written, and judiciously balanced, Sunset Limited opens a new window onto the American West in a crucial phase of its development and will forever change our perceptions of one of the largest and most important western corporations in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
637 pages, Hardcover
First published May 16, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
August 22, 2007
This actually could have been a three star review, but I have to give credit to the thuroughness of the scholarship, the excellent photographs and the superb 200+ end notes, which are a mini-book in themselves.
Orsi's book is "revisionist" if it is proper to call a thesis that glorifies a massive American corporation "revisionist". I suppose that it qualifies if one is taking the scholarship of major American and French universities from the sixties onward as the standard.
Simply put, Orsi's goal is to set the record straight about the Southern Pacific. No "Octopus" in his eyes, the Southern Pacific was an important innovator in the area of agriculture, conservation and scientific forestry. Indeed, without the Southern Pacific, California and the west as we know it would not have been possible.
Aside from rewriting bits of history from the railroad's perspective, Orsi's main scholarly contribution is his access to the Southern Pacific's own corporate records. Certainly this is an approach that gives a more complicated picture of the corporations motives and morals then the simplistic "Octopus" portrait of Frank Norris.
Orsi also has access to better statistics then scholars operating in the past had (i.e. the railroad's internal statistics), so that allows him to fairly castigate those who have painted an unrealistic portrait of, say, the size of the Southern Pacific's land grants.
Although I am sympathetic to his attempt to rehabilitate the image of the Southern Pacific, I found some of the assertions regarding the tremendous difficulties the S & P had in carrying out its good intentions hard to take. If one was to rely on Orsi's book as one's only source, you might believe that the Southern Pacific was a money losing venture, operated out of sheer philanthropy of the "Big Four".
I'm serious about that comment: There is no mention about the tremendous personal fortunes of Stanford, Huntington and Co., let alone any discussion of the profit of the railroad as a whole. On the other hand, Orsi goes out of his way to demonstrate expenditures the railroad made in support of the common good.
Of course, I can hear the authorial response: Everyone already knows about the money that was made, I'm trying to fill in the stuff that everyone doesn't know.
Still, one example: The S & P operated the Pacific Land Company, which operated at the behest of the Big Four by subdividing land for sale. Orsi says that there wasn't any record of how much money that Land Company made and says it's impossible to even determine how the land and profit was accounted for within the S & P. Is that so? I find it curious, as I found the curious the almost complete lack of (positive) financial data.
On the whole, I thought Orsi does a great job. However, I would have liked more balance, even if he is writing this book to even the score.
Orsi's book is "revisionist" if it is proper to call a thesis that glorifies a massive American corporation "revisionist". I suppose that it qualifies if one is taking the scholarship of major American and French universities from the sixties onward as the standard.
Simply put, Orsi's goal is to set the record straight about the Southern Pacific. No "Octopus" in his eyes, the Southern Pacific was an important innovator in the area of agriculture, conservation and scientific forestry. Indeed, without the Southern Pacific, California and the west as we know it would not have been possible.
Aside from rewriting bits of history from the railroad's perspective, Orsi's main scholarly contribution is his access to the Southern Pacific's own corporate records. Certainly this is an approach that gives a more complicated picture of the corporations motives and morals then the simplistic "Octopus" portrait of Frank Norris.
Orsi also has access to better statistics then scholars operating in the past had (i.e. the railroad's internal statistics), so that allows him to fairly castigate those who have painted an unrealistic portrait of, say, the size of the Southern Pacific's land grants.
Although I am sympathetic to his attempt to rehabilitate the image of the Southern Pacific, I found some of the assertions regarding the tremendous difficulties the S & P had in carrying out its good intentions hard to take. If one was to rely on Orsi's book as one's only source, you might believe that the Southern Pacific was a money losing venture, operated out of sheer philanthropy of the "Big Four".
I'm serious about that comment: There is no mention about the tremendous personal fortunes of Stanford, Huntington and Co., let alone any discussion of the profit of the railroad as a whole. On the other hand, Orsi goes out of his way to demonstrate expenditures the railroad made in support of the common good.
Of course, I can hear the authorial response: Everyone already knows about the money that was made, I'm trying to fill in the stuff that everyone doesn't know.
Still, one example: The S & P operated the Pacific Land Company, which operated at the behest of the Big Four by subdividing land for sale. Orsi says that there wasn't any record of how much money that Land Company made and says it's impossible to even determine how the land and profit was accounted for within the S & P. Is that so? I find it curious, as I found the curious the almost complete lack of (positive) financial data.
On the whole, I thought Orsi does a great job. However, I would have liked more balance, even if he is writing this book to even the score.
March 5, 2012
An impressive though certainly overly comprehensive rejoinder to the typical progressive, railroad-bashing tomes that litter modern history libraries.
Unlike most historians, Orsi is a rabid railfan, thoroughly enamored of the majesty and accomplishments of the 19th century railroads, and he brings his enthusiasm for rails and California history to this presentation of the Southern Pacific Railroad during its glory days, when this now forgotten company was the largest transportation concern on the planet as well as one of the biggest corporations in existence. It also did more to develop the American West than any other entity.
If the company is remembered for anything today it is through its fictional portrayal in Frank Norris's "The Octopus" (1901), which featured a sensationalist picture of the Mussel Slough tragedy of 1880, where seven squatters on Southern Pacific land were killed in a land dispute. Far from being a classic people-against-the-powerful story, Orsi shows that the Southern Pacific gave the squatters (who were often land speculators who kept their real farms elsewhere) numerous attempts to buy the land at below market prices, and only when other settlers insisted on securing their legally purchased titles did the company send a US Marshal and local sheriff to evict the squatters. Despite the appellation "massacre," neither of these officials drew their guns at the scene, and squatters ready to shoot innocents to protect their ill-gotten gains basically shot themselves during the ensuing chaos. Martyrs to corporate greed they were not.
Orsi also confronts charges that the company was a "land monopolist" (it worked hard to settle small farmers on 160 acre grants and curtailed large holdings) and an environmental berserker (it was at the forefront of the battle over protecting Yosemite National Park and was essential in winning the 1884 circuit court case banning "hydraulic mining).
Orsi spent years in the company archives proving his point, and overall he makes a strong case, but his tendency to take the railroad's side in every dispute becomes somewhat tiresome (did it not acquire millions of acres and dollars from the federal government while providing little in return?). Also despite his eye-opening look at the daily operations of the railroads land, passenger, publicity and water departments, there's simply too much in here. Two hundred pages shorter would have made a better book.
Unlike most historians, Orsi is a rabid railfan, thoroughly enamored of the majesty and accomplishments of the 19th century railroads, and he brings his enthusiasm for rails and California history to this presentation of the Southern Pacific Railroad during its glory days, when this now forgotten company was the largest transportation concern on the planet as well as one of the biggest corporations in existence. It also did more to develop the American West than any other entity.
If the company is remembered for anything today it is through its fictional portrayal in Frank Norris's "The Octopus" (1901), which featured a sensationalist picture of the Mussel Slough tragedy of 1880, where seven squatters on Southern Pacific land were killed in a land dispute. Far from being a classic people-against-the-powerful story, Orsi shows that the Southern Pacific gave the squatters (who were often land speculators who kept their real farms elsewhere) numerous attempts to buy the land at below market prices, and only when other settlers insisted on securing their legally purchased titles did the company send a US Marshal and local sheriff to evict the squatters. Despite the appellation "massacre," neither of these officials drew their guns at the scene, and squatters ready to shoot innocents to protect their ill-gotten gains basically shot themselves during the ensuing chaos. Martyrs to corporate greed they were not.
Orsi also confronts charges that the company was a "land monopolist" (it worked hard to settle small farmers on 160 acre grants and curtailed large holdings) and an environmental berserker (it was at the forefront of the battle over protecting Yosemite National Park and was essential in winning the 1884 circuit court case banning "hydraulic mining).
Orsi spent years in the company archives proving his point, and overall he makes a strong case, but his tendency to take the railroad's side in every dispute becomes somewhat tiresome (did it not acquire millions of acres and dollars from the federal government while providing little in return?). Also despite his eye-opening look at the daily operations of the railroads land, passenger, publicity and water departments, there's simply too much in here. Two hundred pages shorter would have made a better book.
June 30, 2020
Albeit a bit long winded and somewhat marred by an apologist veneer, The Sunset Limited delivers on a catalytic moment in California history. Operating far from the United States’ eastern centers of power and regulation, the Southern Pacific Railway emerges as the most powerful entity to shape the west; most notably in California which becomes the world’s economic powerhouse we know today upon the foundation built by a railroad company. This is the kind of story that makes you fall in love with America as it serves us a big reminder of how responsible levels of manifest destiny hath brought forth seemingly endless bounties of plenty from our great lands when combined with the will and hard work to deserve it.
November 28, 2021
I actually started this book several years ago and put it down for reasons I cannot recall. Apparently, I was in a better place this time as I had in recent years become enamored with environmental history and it’s study. Orsi’s work actually dovetails quite nicely with that field of inquiry.
This book could have easily been subtitled “Behind the Octopus” as it takes the reader into a well-researched journey into aspects of the “Octopus” not generally known or discussed. It was a refreshing take on what positive things grew in the shadows of this giant corporation.
This book could have easily been subtitled “Behind the Octopus” as it takes the reader into a well-researched journey into aspects of the “Octopus” not generally known or discussed. It was a refreshing take on what positive things grew in the shadows of this giant corporation.
December 14, 2012
"The railroad's founders and most of its later top executives and, importantly, its middle-level managers were Californians, often long-time residents. With remarkable tenure in their positions, these men identified their company's interests with those of their home state, its economic, social, and cultural development, and secondarily with the larger West." (21)
"[T]he railway developed a land-management and sales program aimed primarily at building traffic for its lines, and from the start adopted a supportive and conciliatory stance toward small-farm settlers." (79)
"The Southern Pacific was well suited to playing a creative role in water development. The railroad's modern, centralized business structure, like its tracks, bridged the gaps between sections and rival interest groups and provided a measure of coordination. One of the few entities with a broad interest in water that transcended local parochialism, the company was also frequently the largest, most active organizational presences on the raw frontier. The railroad commanded the labor and capital essential for expensive water improvements as well as access to modern technology and the expertise of its own civil engineers and land agents or outside consultants." (171-2).
"The Southern Pacific's major nineteenth-century work in agricultural marketing was to advertise the virtues of California and far western produce, particularly fruit, in the growing urban centers of the Middle West." (322)
"Even in the late nineteenth century, but especially after 1900, the railroad also encouraged the expansion of regulatory law and centralized public management of land, water, and other resource matters. But, when the growth of the public regulatory function was lacking or delayed, the Southern Pacific, pursuing the corporate interest of expanding and more reliable profits, sometimes furnished organization and conflict within its territory, resulting in ongoing private resource-management programs. When these programs, as often happened, were converted into permanent public functions, the railroad typically helped to bring about and shape the new agencies or programs." (404)
"[T]he railway developed a land-management and sales program aimed primarily at building traffic for its lines, and from the start adopted a supportive and conciliatory stance toward small-farm settlers." (79)
"The Southern Pacific was well suited to playing a creative role in water development. The railroad's modern, centralized business structure, like its tracks, bridged the gaps between sections and rival interest groups and provided a measure of coordination. One of the few entities with a broad interest in water that transcended local parochialism, the company was also frequently the largest, most active organizational presences on the raw frontier. The railroad commanded the labor and capital essential for expensive water improvements as well as access to modern technology and the expertise of its own civil engineers and land agents or outside consultants." (171-2).
"The Southern Pacific's major nineteenth-century work in agricultural marketing was to advertise the virtues of California and far western produce, particularly fruit, in the growing urban centers of the Middle West." (322)
"Even in the late nineteenth century, but especially after 1900, the railroad also encouraged the expansion of regulatory law and centralized public management of land, water, and other resource matters. But, when the growth of the public regulatory function was lacking or delayed, the Southern Pacific, pursuing the corporate interest of expanding and more reliable profits, sometimes furnished organization and conflict within its territory, resulting in ongoing private resource-management programs. When these programs, as often happened, were converted into permanent public functions, the railroad typically helped to bring about and shape the new agencies or programs." (404)
October 31, 2008
The Southern Pacific was one of the best of the Guilded Age railroads and it pioneered many aspects of modern American business. It spanned from the Gulf of Mexico in Texas across New Mexico, Arizona, California, Oregon, Nevada, and Utah. Sadly this book is California-centric with no concentration on operations in other states. It didn't even mention the regularity of train robbings east of Tucson and how the railroad dealt with it. Sections dealing with the Salton Sea and Pacific Fruit Express were interesting but otherwise this was as dry a corporate history as has ever been penned.
July 16, 2010
This is Southern Pacific's side of the railroad's development. Portrays Theodore Judah as being a poor manager (still, he was a guide surveyor and political promoter)
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews