Overview

Collis Huntington Holladay of San Marino, California, made available documents and letters written by his great uncle. They are cited in the Notes as 'Holladay Collection'. The letters sent by Collis Huntington to his brother Solon during the gold-rush period and the subsequent years in Sacramento, form a significant part of the Holladay collection and were particularly valuable in allowing a reconstruction of a hitherto little known period of Collis' life. This book includes lavish and fascinating detail, emphasising in particular the complex, often illegal, financial and political wirepulling that generally won the day for Huntington.

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9780870814761

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. . . lavish and fascinating detail, emphasizing in particular the complex, often illegal, financial and political wirepulling that generally won the day for Huntington. <i>Kirkus</i>

One of nineteenth-century America's less familiar success stories - the rise of Collis P. Huntington from untutored village storekeeper to California railway magnate - now receives fine handling by an experienced chronicler of the Great West (Climax at Buena Vista; Land of Giants). Beginning with Huntington's arrival in gold-mad Sacramento, the narrative moves through the founding of the Central Pacific toward the dramatic achievement of the first transcontinental rail link, when Huntington's engineers, directed to seize and defend roadbed turf far in advance of their work crews, raced east to head off further westward progress by the rival Union Pacific. Drawing primarily on Huntington's correspondence, Lavender describes this and subsequent triumphs in lavish and fascinating detail, emphasizing in particular the complex, often illegal, financial and political wirepulling that generally won the day for Huntington. Like the tycoon himself, the author downplays the contributions of his business associates (the better known Leland Stanford, co-founder of the Central Pacific, is treated here as lazy, vain, and stupid). There is also a lack of historical background against which the reader could understand the significance of Huntington's railway empire. Nonetheless, this book is exciting as a portrait of a roughhewn, grasping visonary whose career demonstrates that blend of entrepreneurial genius and frank chicanery that really won the West. (Kirkus Reviews)

. . . lavish and fascinating detail, emphasizing in particular the complex, often illegal, financial and political wirepulling that generally won the day for Huntington. -- Kirkus

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David Lavender

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