Builders of the Hoosac Tunnel

The Smithsonian Institution’s Dibner Library of the History of Science and Technology is located in the bowels of the National Museum of American History. Cliff was one of the fortunate who, having received a Dibner Library Resident Scholar award, spent many an hour on the other side of those secreted doors. It was an experience rather like that of C. S. Lewis’s Lucy, who climbed into the wardrobe and discovered a magical land. He met no White Witch, but the experience produced this book—the result of a wonderful adventurous journey.

Builders of the Hoosac Tunnel traces the interactions between those who worked to bore the five-mile Hoosac railroad tunnel and those who hindered its construction. From the railroad stockholders, to the Canadian brothers who achieved daylight through the mountain, the story follows the evolution of American Civil Engineering.