During the building of the railroads, Chinese workers were consistently demonised by their white bosses and counterparts. 

This, paired with the fact that most primary source material comes from white European bosses, means harmful stereotypes of Chinese immigrants have lived on, resulting in racism against the Chinese community. 

One example of these harmful stereotypes concerns the alleged violence of immigrant workers on the railroad, perpetrated in the memoirs of General Grenville M. Dodge, Chief engineer on the Union Pacific Line. He claimed he witnessed ‘skirmishes’ between Chinese workers on the Central Pacific Line, and Irish workers on the Union Pacific Line. However, these interactions were completely made up, as the Irish and Chinese workers never interacted. However, by perpetrating this rumour, Dodge contributed to the idea that immigrant workers were inherently violent and ‘uncivilised’, allowing for white Americans to ‘claim’ the railroad, erasing the work of immigrants in building the railroad. 

The problem of the demonisation of immigrants can be seen in the above cartoon, where derogatory caricatures of Chinese immigrants can be seen swallowing Uncle Sam, created in the 1860s. This reflects fears of ‘uncivilised’ immigrants, which resulted in efforts to exclude immigrants and their achievements from the railroad as a symbol of American progress.

  The railroad was a significant symbol of American progress and identity. However, this photo crucially excludes the Chinese workers, further demonstrating efforts to distance the work of Chinese immigrants from the railroad, ‘claiming’ it for white Americans.

 The systematic exclusion of Chinese immigrants did not end with the railroad. In 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act was introduced, designed to severely limit the number of Chinese immigrants entering the United States. This law marked the first ‘skill based’ restriction of immigration and was arguably motivated by the demonisation and systematic exclusion of Chinese railroad workers. It placed restrictions on ‘unskilled’ Chinese workers, allowing only merchants, even then only after lengthy interrogation. 

This diminishes the work of Chinese immigrants in creating the American landscape, painting them as ‘unskilled’ when they were often carrying out work that required more skill than their white counterparts. Therefore, the Chinese Exclusion Act perfectly represents the systematic erasure of the contributions that Chinese immigrants made in the American wilderness, in an attempt to ‘reclaim’ the wilderness for white Americans as part of their identity.