Horses
USA - Delaware State Quarter


Obverse
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Reverse
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Coin Details

  

Set Details
Coin Description: SC50C 1969
Grade: NGC MEDAL MS 68
Owner: brg5658
 
Set Category: Thematic & Topical Coins
Set Name: Horses
Slot Name: USA - Delaware State Quarter
Research: Currently not available

Owner's Description

Purchased on 5/9/2012. In 1869, the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad was a startling and dramatic event which captured the public imagination no less than the landing of the first man on the moon a century later. Not only did the steel track physically unite the nation, East and West, but it helped spiritually to heal the wounds of the Civil War with a unifying sense of great accomplishment and national unity. The locomotive pictured on the obverse is not one of the more than 150 shipped around the Horn (a journey which took from 3-9 months) to the Southern Pacific for its part in building the Western portion of the road. It is the "Sacramento", first locomotive in California, built by the Boston Locomotive Works in 1855 and used on the little Sacramento Valley RR. It has been chosen here as a symbol of the engineering achievement in the construction work, for its part in penetrating the Sierras. To speed construction, tunneling continued in the raw winter months when the brutal mountain weather precluded grading and track-laying. For the challenging Summit Tunnel at 7,042 feet, it was decided to sink a shaft at the middle of the site, and double the work rate by having crews work in both directions in 1866-7. The plan faltered due to difficulty in hoisting out the waste, until the "Sacramento" was sledged to the site in a frightening trip, where it served as an efficient hoisting engine. Later it was returned to motive work until it blew up at Latrobe in 1876. The reverse illustrates a wandering Indian observing the distant Golden Spike ceremonies on May 10, 1869, an event which signaled an abrupt end to his way of life.

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