Golden Spike National Historical Site

Golden Spike National Historical Park is a United States National Historical Park located at Promontory Summit, north of the Great Salt Lake in east-central Box Elder County, Utah, United States. The nearest city is Corinne, approximately 23 miles (37 km) east-southeast of the site.  It commemorates the completion of the first Transcontinental Railroad where the Central Pacific Railroad and the first Union Pacific Railroad met on May 10, 1869. The final joining of the rails spanning the continent was signified by the driving of the ceremonial golden spike.  The Golden Spike National Historical Park encompasses 2,735 acres. Initially just 7 acres when it was established in 1957, limited to the area near the junction of the two rail systems, the site was expanded by 2,176 acres in 1965 through land swaps and acquisition of a strip of land mostly 400 feet wide along 151⁄2 miles of the former railroad right-of-way. It reached its present size in 1980. In addition to the Summit site where the rails were joined, the Park includes the two linear areas known as the west slope (west of the junction) and the east slope (east of the junction), which include worker campsites, partially-completed grades, incomplete cuts, specialty workshops, and two historical landmarks: where the Central Pacific finished its "Ten miles of track, laid in one day" track laying record (west slope) and where the Big Fill and Big Trestle were completed (east slope).  Although the line was abandoned in 1904 (bypassed by the Lucin Cutoff) and the original rails were removed in 1942 to serve the war effort, the site presently includes 2 miles of rebuilt track from the summit area (where the rail systems were joined) to a train storage building. The rebuilt track was designed to be an authentic representation of the 1869 rails.