'Well, gentlemen,' said Sibley, 'if you won't join hands with me in the
thing, I'll go it alone.' He procured a subsidy from the Government, who
realised the value of the line from a national point of view, the money
was raised under the auspices of the Western Union, and the route by
Omaha, Fort Laramie, and Salt Lake City to San Francisco was fixed upon.
The work began on July 4, 1861, and though it was expected to occupy two
years, it was completed in four months and eleven days. The traffic
soon became lucrative, and the Indians, except in time of war, protected
the line out of friendship for Mr. Sibley. A black-tailed buck, the
gift of White Cloud, spent its last years in the park of his home at
Rochester.
The success of the overland wire induced the Company to embark on a
still greater scheme, the project of Mr. Perry MacDonough Collins, for a
trunk line between America and Europe by way of British Columbia,
Alaska, the Aleutian Islands, and Siberia. A line already existed
between European Russia and Irkutsk, in Siberia, and it was to be
extended to the mouth of the Amoor, where the American lines were to
join it. Two cables, one across Behring Sea and another across the Bay
of Anadyr, were to link the two continents.
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