Promontory Point

The photograph is famous. Two steam engines, massive like steel destriers, one aimed at either distant coast, converging on that sliver of Utah countryside. There are men everywhere in frame that there is room for them. The men here are hard men, chambray men, grimed and lined by sun and grit. A man stands atop one hulking engine and proffers a champagne bottle to a man man opposite him holding an empty slender glass. There are other men in suits with watch chains bridging the rounded landscape between their lapels. The emotions visible are only the barest expressions of reserved pride. Men lean poised on the sidewalls of the steam engines, reposed on crooked arms, their mouths sly smiles beneath the shadowed coronas provided by their hats. In the foreground, two men make a show of shaking hands. And of course, behind these two men, standing somewhat timidly, much of him obscured by an unfortunate top hat, is The Beacon. The steady glow emitted from the portal at the face of his helmet is evident as a bright blur in the primitive nineteenth-century photography.

-from The Beacon