Page 14 - spike-harrington1976

the north and south was only a half inch out of line.
Another version is that Frates finished 'boring the tunnel
in August 1876 when he personally removed the final
cart of earth. Water is said to have gushed from the
tunnel from one end to the other and after a year and
a half, the San Fernando Mountain was drained. Timber-
ing was completed the same month and not long after
that, the tracklayers finally laid the rails from the
mountain's summit to the northern entrance. From
nearby Lyon's Station, the news was flashed to Los
Angeles that the rails were in the tunnel. The first train
passed through the San Fernando Tunnel on August
12, 1876.
The tracklayers f:rom Tehachapi were steadily laying
around 2 ½ miles of rail per day. As they reached Mojave,
they laid track east of Willow Springs and past Lan-
caster Station. By this time it is estimated that 4000
workers were furiously pushing ahead from desolate
Soledad Canyon south and the San Fernando Tunnel
north, trying desperately to meet and close the remain-
ing gap between them.
Charles Crocker, president of the Southern Pacific
watched progress from Lang's Hotel and on the morning
of September 4, he was able to send a message to the
Southern Pacific in San Francisco and to ex-Governor
John G. Downey in Los Angeles, that all was ready to
lay the golden spike on the following day.
Completion of the tunnel made it one of the longest
railroad tunnels then in the United States, exceeded only
by tunnels in Virginia and Massachusetts and one in
Switzerland. Sutro's famous tunnel into the Comstock
Lode was not a realroad tunnel such as the others
mentioned.

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