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60-624: The Golden Spike (also known as The Last Spike ) is the ceremonial 17.6- karat gold final spike driven by Leland Stanford to join the rails of the first transcontinental railroad across the United States connecting the Central Pacific Railroad from Sacramento and the Union Pacific Railroad from Omaha on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Summit, Utah Territory . The term last spike has been used to refer to one driven at

120-630: A commemorative marker in 1943. The following year a commemorative postage stamp was issued to mark the 75th anniversary. The years after the war saw a revival of interest in the event; the first re-enactment was staged in 1948. In 1957, Congress established the Golden Spike National Historic Site to preserve the area around Promontory Summit as closely as possible to its appearance in 1869. O'Connor Engineering Laboratories in Costa Mesa, California, designed and built working replicas of

180-457: A concern because it would be possible for an unscrupulous refiner to produce precious metals bars that are slightly less pure than marked on the bar. A refiner doing $ 1 billion of business each year that marked .980 pure bars as .999 fine would make about an extra $ 20 million in profit. In the United States, the actual purity of gold articles must be no more than .003 less than the marked purity (e.g. .996 fine for gold marked .999 fine), and

240-406: A conversational tool on websites and major news outlets. This method is used to invite participants to take a survey, which can generate thousands of responses or more. These polls are self-selected and can be used to drive more traffic to the website, which can cause the need for more news and generate more revenue. The large volume of responses can improve the image that is being reported rather than

300-421: A fineness of 11 ounces, 2 pennyweights, or exactly ( 11 + 2 20 ) 12 = 92.5 % {\displaystyle {\frac {(11+{\frac {2}{20}})}{12}}=92.5\%} silver. Media event A media event, also known as a pseudo-event , is an event, activity, or experience conducted for the purpose of creating media publicity . It may also be any event that

360-544: A great story that makes an impact on the public. Examples include politicians taking photos with citizens to boost their likeability and press conferences. Though this is very common, using this media technique has been criticized for not producing authentic material, which is seen as stylistic instead of substantial informational. The public relations industry targets all sectors, not just government, with pseudo-events on behalf of representing and maintaining their clients’ interests and image. This can bring into question if some of

420-560: A labor dispute that delayed the arrival of the Union Pacific side of the rail line. On May 10, in anticipation of the ceremony, Union Pacific No. 119 and Central Pacific No. 60 (better known as the Jupiter ) locomotives were drawn up face-to-face on Promontory Summit. It is unknown how many people attended the event; estimates run from as low as 500 to as many as 3,000; government and railroad officials and track workers were present to witness

480-409: A less-than-24-karat gold alloy differs according to the alloys used. For example, knowing that standard 18-karat yellow gold consists of 75% gold, 12.5% silver and the remaining 12.5% of copper (all by mass), the volume of pure gold in this alloy will be 60% since gold is much denser than the other metals used: 19.32 g/cm for gold, 10.49 g/cm for silver and 8.96 g/cm for copper. Karat

540-409: A media event are that it is immediate (i.e., it is broadcast live), organized by a non-media entity, containing ceremonial and dramatic value, preplanning, and focusing on a personality, whether that be a single person or a group. The 2009 book Media Events in a Global Age updates the concept. The theory of media events has also been applied to social media, for instance in an analysis of tweets about

600-515: A meta media-event-within-a-media-event. From a postmodern perspective, Jean Baudrillard argued in his essay The Gulf War Did Not Take Place that the Gulf War , the first war broadcast on television, was not a real war, but a media event planned by the US army and media outlets like CNN. These events are used by public relations professionals to satisfy journalists’ interests and needs so they can create

660-524: A more realistic experience. Examples include taking photos with a character or actor who plays the part of an authentic local or buying souvenirs at a market. Some tourists don't notice these events because they are made to distract from everyday life. Boorstin has viewed celebrities as ‘human pseudo-events’, specifically in American culture thought history, since the 1800s. Celebrities have an image that represents an ideal life, an elite status and persona that

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720-626: A number roughly equivalent to the city's then population. The celebration was opened by President Franklin D. Roosevelt who inaugurated it by pressing a telegraph key at the White House in Washington, DC. On the same day as the premiere of the movie, a still standing gold-colored concrete spike called the "Golden Spike Monument," measuring some 56 feet (17 m) in height, was unveiled at 21st Street and 9th Avenue in Council Bluffs, Iowa, adjacent to

780-578: A pseudo-event and a spontaneous one, Boorstin states characteristics of a pseudo-event in his book titled "Hidden History." He says that a pseudo-event is: dramatic, repeatable, costly, intellectually planned, and social. It causes other pseudo-events, and one must know about it to be considered "informed". Media events became prominent when the media did. The driving of the Golden Spike in Promontory Summit, Utah , in 1869 has been described as one of

840-447: A silver ceremonial spike maul . The spike was engraved on all four sides: The spike was removed immediately after being hammered in to prevent it from being stolen. A second golden spike, exactly like the one from the ceremony (except for the date), was cast at the same time, and probably engraved at a later time with the correct Promontory date of May 10, 1869. It has been noted that the first Golden Spike engraving appeared "rushed", and

900-588: Is a variant of carat . First attested in English in the mid-15th century, the word carat came from Middle French carat , in turn derived either from Italian carato or Medieval Latin carratus . These were borrowed into Medieval Europe from the Arabic qīrāṭ meaning "fruit of the carob tree", also "weight of 5 grains", ( قيراط ) and was a unit of mass though it was probably not used to measure gold in classical times. The Arabic term ultimately originates from

960-457: Is believed to be the origin of the value of the karat. While there are many methods of detecting fake precious metals, there are realistically only two options available for verifying the marked fineness of metal as being reasonably accurate: assaying the metal (which requires destroying it), or using X-ray fluorescence (XRF). XRF will measure only the outermost portion of the piece of metal and so may get misled by thick plating. That becomes

1020-482: Is covered in the mass media or was hosted largely with the media in mind. In media studies, "media event" is an established theoretical term first developed by Elihu Katz and Daniel Dayan in the 1992 book Media Events: The Live Broadcasting of History. Media events in this sense are ceremonial events with narrative progression that are live broadcast and gather a large segment of the population, such as royal weddings or funerals. The defining characteristics of

1080-408: Is held, photographs are taken , the occasion is widely reported.” The term is closely related to idea of hyperreality and thus postmodernism , although Boorstin's coinage predates the two ideas and related work of postmodern thinkers such as Jean Baudrillard . A media event being a kind of planned event , it may be called inauthentic in contrast to a spontaneous one. In distinguishing between

1140-456: Is increasingly being complemented or superseded by the millesimal system, described above for bullion, though jewelry generally tends to still use the karat system. Conversion between percentage of pure gold and karats: However, this system of calculation gives only the mass of pure gold contained in an alloy. The term 18-karat gold means that the alloy's mass consists of 75% of gold and 25% of other metals. The quantity of gold by volume in

1200-463: Is often not the case. Boorstin has noted that these pseudo-events' main goals are meeting increased demands for more news and revenue generation. Since 1991 when Baudrillard made the bold claim that " The Gulf War Did Not Take Place ", the authenticity of war coverages has long been debated. Similar claims have also been made on the Russo-Ukrainian War , which broke out against the backdrop of

1260-508: Is separate from everyday life. They are seen as glamorous but with a distance from the public sphere. There are some celebrities that portray a life that seems unattainable by many, then there are celebrities who are famous for actual achievements. Examples of pseudo-events created by celebrities range from anything from signing autographs, making public appearances, holding an exclusive event, or doing projects with charities.   Non-scientific internet polls have been increasingly popular as

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1320-480: Is used in the United Kingdom and United States. It is an extension of the older karat system of denoting the purity of gold by fractions of 24, such as "18 karat" for an alloy with 75% (18 parts per 24) pure gold by mass. The millesimal fineness is usually rounded to a three figure number, particularly where used as a hallmark , and the fineness may vary slightly from the traditional versions of purity. Here are

1380-557: Is very difficult to attain, 24-karat as a designation is permitted in commerce for a minimum of 99.95% purity), 18-karat gold is 18 parts gold, 6 parts another metal (forming an alloy with 75% gold), 12-karat gold is 12 parts gold (12 parts another metal), and so forth. In England, the carat was divisible into four grains, and the grain was divisible into four quarts. For example, a gold alloy of 127 ⁄ 128 fineness (that is, 99.2% purity) could have been described as being 23-karat, 3-grain, 1-quart gold . The karat fractional system

1440-453: The Greek kerátion ( κεράτιον ) meaning carob seed (literally "small horn") (diminutive of κέρας – kéras , "horn" ). In 309 AD, Roman Emperor Constantine I began to mint a new gold coin solidus that was 1 ⁄ 72 of a libra (Roman pound) of gold equal to a mass of 24 siliquae , where each siliqua (or carat ) was 1 ⁄ 1728 of a libra. This

1500-862: The Missouri River between Council Bluffs, Iowa , and Omaha, Nebraska , by boat until the building of the Union Pacific Missouri River Bridge in March 1872. In the meantime, a coast-to-coast rail link was achieved in August 1870 in Strasburg, Colorado , by the completion of the Denver extension of the Kansas Pacific Railway . In 1904 a new railroad route called the Lucin Cutoff was built by-passing

1560-538: The 145th anniversary of the Golden Spike ceremony, Corky Lee gathered 200+ Chinese, Chinese Americans and other Asian Pacific Americans groups to create what he called "photographic justice". Research done by Stanford's "Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project" disproved the myth, identifying two Chinese laborers who were photographed in the famous A.J. Russell shot. More Chinese laborers who attended

1620-514: The 1969 ceremony no Chinese representatives spoke during the dedication of a plaque memorializing Chinese railroad workers. The 2019 ceremony brought an intentionally greater focus on the Chinese contribution with Elaine Chao then United States Secretary of Transportation speaking at the event. The Chinese Railway Workers Descendants Association continues to hold annual gatherings at Chinese Arch near Promontory. A monument dedicated to Chinese workers on

1680-459: The 50th anniversary parade. At the conclusion of the ceremony, the participating Chinese workers were honored and cheered by the CPRR officials and that road's construction chief, J.H. Strobridge, at a dinner in his private car. To drive the final spike, Stanford lifted a silver spike maul and drove the spike into the tie, completing the line. Stanford and Hewes missed the spike, but the single word "done"

1740-699: The American Gold Eagle is embossed One Oz. Fine Gold and weighs 1.091 troy oz. Fineness of silver in Britain was traditionally expressed as the mass of silver expressed in troy ounces and pennyweights ( 1 ⁄ 20 troy ounce) in one troy pound (12 troy ounces) of the resulting alloy. Britannia silver has a fineness of 11 ounces, 10 pennyweights, or about ( 11 + 10 20 ) 12 = 95.833 % {\displaystyle {\frac {(11+{\frac {10}{20}})}{12}}=95.833\%} silver, whereas sterling silver has

1800-688: The Golden Spike Days Celebration was held in Omaha, Nebraska, from April 26 to 29, 1939, to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the joining of the UP and CPRR rails and driving of the Last Spike at Promontory Summit, Utah, in 1869. The center piece event of the celebration occurred on April 28 with the world premiere of the Cecil B. DeMille feature motion picture Union Pacific which took place simultaneously in

1860-585: The Hewes family spike lettering appeared more polished. It was held, unknown to the public, by the Hewes family until 2005. This second spike is now on permanent display, along with Thomas Hill's famous painting The Last Spike , at the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento. With the locomotives drawn so near, the crowd pressed so closely around Stanford and the other railroad officials that

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1920-611: The Promontory location to the south. By going west across the Great Salt Lake from Ogden, Utah, to Lucin, Utah, the new railroad line shortened the distance by 43 miles and avoided curves and grades. Main line trains no longer passed over Promontory Summit. In 1942, the old rails over Promontory Summit were salvaged for the war effort; the event was marked by a ceremonial "undriving" of the last iron spike. The original event had been all but forgotten except by local residents, who erected

1980-538: The Swedish elections or an analysis of the Bernie Sanders mittens meme during the inauguration of Joe Biden . Media events may center on a news announcement, an anniversary , a news conference , or planned events like speeches or demonstrations. Instead of paying for advertising time, a media or pseudo-event seeks to use public relations to gain media and public attention. The theorist Marshal McLuhan has stated that

2040-507: The UP's main yard, the location of milepost 0.0 of that road's portion of the Pacific Railroad . Carat (purity) The fineness of a precious metal object (coin, bar, jewelry, etc.) represents the weight of fine metal therein, in proportion to the total weight which includes alloying base metals and any impurities . Alloy metals are added to increase hardness and durability of coins and jewelry , alter colors, decrease

2100-438: The actual purity of silver articles must be no more than .004 less than the marked purity. A piece of alloy metal containing a precious metal may also have the weight of its precious component referred to as its "fine weight". For example, 1 troy ounce of 18 karat gold (which is 75% gold) may be said to have a fine weight of 0.75 troy ounces. Most modern government-issued bullion coins specify their fine weight. For example,

2160-556: The ceremony became somewhat disorganized, leading to varying accounts of the actual events. On the Union Pacific side, thrusting westward, the last two rails were laid by Irishmen; on the Central Pacific side, thrusting eastward, the last two rails were laid by the Chinese! A.J. Russell stereoview No. 539 shows the "Chinese at Laying Last Rail UPRR". Eight Chinese workers laid the last rail, and three of these men, Ging Cui, Wong Fook, and Lee Shao, lived long enough to also participate in

2220-478: The city's Omaha, Orpheum, and Paramount theaters. The film features an elaborate reenactment of the original Golden Spike ceremony (filmed in Canoga Park, California) as the motion picture's closing scene for which DeMille borrowed the actual Golden Spike from Stanford University to be held by Dr. W.H. Harkness ( Stanley Andrews ) as he delivered his remarks prior to its driving to complete the railroad. (A prop spike

2280-652: The completion of the Pacific Railroad "from the Missouri river to the Pacific" authorized by the Pacific Railroad Acts , much less a seamless coast-to-coast rail network: neither Sacramento nor Omaha was a seaport, nor did they have rail connections until after they were designated as the termini. Western Pacific completed the westernmost transcontinental leg from Sacramento to San Francisco Bay on September 6, 1869, with

2340-613: The cost per weight, or avoid the cost of high-purity refinement. For example, copper is added to the precious metal silver to make a more durable alloy for use in coins, housewares and jewelry. Coin silver, which was used for making silver coins in the past, contains 90% silver and 10% copper, by mass . Sterling silver contains 92.5% silver and 7.5% of other metals, usually copper, by mass. Various ways of expressing fineness have been used and two remain in common use: millesimal fineness expressed in units of parts per 1,000 and karats or carats used only for gold . Karats measure

2400-419: The culture. The locals know that these attractions aren't always a true reflection of life in that country, but rather a hyperreality to satisfy the desire to see the real thing. Tourists are in search for the authenticity when visiting but these events that appear as one thing are not truly authentic; it is a symbol. In a postmodern perspective, tourists can enjoy these staged attractions and activities to get

2460-520: The event by the William T. Garratt Foundry in San Francisco. Two of the sides were engraved with the names of the railroad officers and directors. A special tie of polished California laurel was chosen to complete the line where the spike would be driven. The ceremony was originally to be held on May 8, 1869 (the date actually engraved on the spike), but it was postponed two days because of bad weather and

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2520-464: The event. Before the last spike was driven, three other commemorative spikes, presented on behalf of the other three members of the Central Pacific's Big Four who did not attend the ceremony, had been driven in the pre-bored laurel tie: The golden spike was made of 17.6- karat (73%) copper-alloyed gold, and weighed 14.03 troy ounces (436 g). It was dropped into a pre-drilled hole in the laurel ceremonial last tie, and gently tapped into place with

2580-402: The first media events in the United States. Edward Bernays and his Torches of Freedom campaign in 1929 is an example of an early media event that successfully influenced public opinion. Similarly, Nikita Khrushchev visit to the United States in 1959 was highly influential, and has been cited as the first example of media events being utilized in politics. Media events became practical in

2640-414: The golden spike. It remains a common myth that Chinese workers are not visible in the famous A.J. Russell "champagne photo" of the last spike ceremony. Many Chinese workers were absent from the Golden Spike ceremony in 1869 despite their tremendous contribution in the completion of the railroad. Over 12,000 Chinese had labored to build the rail line from the west, 80% of the railroad workers were Chinese. On

2700-468: The last iron spike was driven, finally completing the line. After the ceremony, the Golden Spike was donated to the Stanford Museum (now Cantor Arts Center ) in 1898. The last laurel tie was destroyed in the fires caused by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake . Although the Promontory event marked the completion of the transcontinental railroad from Omaha to Sacramento on May 10, 1869, it did not mark

2760-475: The last leg into Salt Lake City, actor John Wayne . The Union Pacific Railroad also sent a special display train and the US Army Transportation Corps sent a steam-powered 3-car special from Fort Eustis , Virginia. On May 10, 2006, on the anniversary of the driving of the spike, Utah announced that its state quarter design would be a depiction of the driving of the spike. The Golden Spike design

2820-789: The last spike at the Mossdale Bridge across the San Joaquin River near Lathrop, California . The official completion date of the Pacific Railroad as called for by Section 6 of the Pacific Railroad Act of 1862, et seq. was determined to be November 6, 1869, by the US Supreme Court in Part I of the Court's Opinion and Order dated January 27, 1879, in re Union Pacific Railroad vs. United States (99 U.S. 402). Passengers were required to cross

2880-469: The last spike ceremony are also visible in A.J. Russell's "stereo view # 539 Chinese at Laying Last Rail UPRR," although the Chinese laborers who attended the ceremony still only represented a small fraction of the total Chinese workforce on the railroad. Three of the Chinese workers who helped build the railroad in 1869, Wong Fook, Lee Chao, and Ging Cui would be given a place in the celebratory 50th anniversary parade at Ogden, Utah , in 1919. However, during

2940-591: The locomotives present at the original ceremony for the Park Service. These engines are drawn up face-to-face each Saturday during the summer for a re-enactment of the event. For the May 10, 1969, centennial of the driving of the last spike, the High Iron Company ran a steam-powered excursion train round trip from New York City to Promontory. The Golden Spike Centennial Limited transported over 100 passengers including, for

3000-412: The media put out is actually true news and can be relied on, especially since serious topics are talked about using this technique. The tourism industry is subject to pseudo-events that are often unnoticed to the average tourist themselves. Every country may have specific sites, attractions, and things to do for a tourist so they can experience what life is like in that country or at least be introduced to

3060-518: The middle 19th century as the Morse telegraph and the expansion of daily newspapers introduced same-day news cycles . The emergence of the internet led to many media stories being published live from the media event, real-time Twitter coverage, and immediate analysis of televised media events. When musical artist Prince pretended to take questions during his Super Bowl press conference but instead broke immediately into song, his performance itself became

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3120-406: The most common millesimal finenesses used for precious metals and the most common terms associated with them. The karat (US spelling, symbol k or Kt ) or carat (UK spelling, symbol c or Ct ) is a fractional measure of purity for gold alloys , in parts fine per 24 parts whole. The karat system is a standard adopted by US federal law. where 24-karat gold is pure (while 100% purity

3180-444: The news content itself. Participants can believe that their participation in these polls can contribute to the reported online survey's topic. Jack Fuller, President of Tribune Publishing Company, has touched on this topic and how this form of gathering information for non-scientific reasons can be inauthentic. The use of these online polls as news content can place scientific polls used for research to be equally as legitimate when that

3240-447: The parts per 24, so that 18 karat = 18 ⁄ 24 = 75% and 24 karat gold is considered 100% gold. Millesimal fineness is a system of denoting the purity of platinum , gold and silver alloys by parts per thousand of pure metal by mass in the alloy. For example, an alloy containing 75% gold is denoted as "750". Many European countries use decimal hallmark stamps (i.e., "585", "750", etc.) rather than "14 k", "18 k", etc., which

3300-501: The pseudo-event has been viewed as an event that is separate from reality and is to simply satisfy our need for constant excitement and interest in pop culture. These events are, “planned, planted, or incited (Merrin, 2002)” solely to be reproduced later again and again. The term "pseudo-event" was coined by the theorist and historian Daniel J. Boorstin in his 1961 book The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-events in America : “The celebration

3360-516: The railroad was installed at the Utah State capitol building to correspond with the 155th anniversary. A Utah state park, planned to celebrate the Golden Spike opening in Brigham City, Utah in 2025, will feature a 43 foot tall statue depicting the Golden Spike. The statue, mounted on the back of a truck; has toured various parts of America throughout 2023 and 2024. An elaborate four-day event called

3420-558: The usually ceremonial completion of any new railroad construction projects, particularly those in which construction is undertaken from two disparate origins towards a common meeting point. The spike is now displayed in the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University . Completing the last link in the transcontinental railroad with a spike of gold was the brainchild of David Hewes , a San Francisco financier and contractor. The spike had been manufactured earlier that year especially for

3480-429: Was nevertheless flashed by telegraph around the country. In the United States, the event has come to be considered one of the first nationwide media events . The locomotives were moved forward until their cowcatchers met, and photographs were taken. Immediately afterwards, the golden spike and the laurel tie were removed, lest they be stolen, and replaced with a regular iron spike and normal tie. At exactly 12:47 pm,

3540-578: Was selected as the winner from among several others by Utah's governor, Jon Huntsman Jr. , following a period during which Utah residents voted and commented on their favorite of three finalists. On May 10, 2019, the United States Postal Service issued a set of three new commemorative postage stamps to mark the 150th anniversary of the driving of the golden spike: one stamp for the Jupiter locomotive, one stamp for locomotive #119, and one stamp for

3600-547: Was used for the actual hammering sequence.) Also included as a part of the overall celebration's major attractions was the Golden Spike Historical Exposition, a large assemblage of artifacts (including the Golden Spike itself), tools, equipment, photographs, documents, and other materials from the construction of the Pacific Railroad that were put on display at Omaha's Municipal Auditorium. The four days of events drew over 250,000 people to Omaha during its run,

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