The Southern Pacific grew into such a leviathan because in addition to operating its extensive rail lines it became a major maritime shipper. Beginning in the 1870s, the railroad and steamship businesses were integrated into a huge transport network that connected the eastern United States with the West Coast and transpacific trade. San Francisco, the West Coast’s busiest port for international trade, was the network’s major hub through which goods and people flowed. Consequently, the state’s Asian Pacific orientation became increasingly pronounced.
Unwilling to let the Pacific Mail Steamship Company (see Chapter 5) dominate the maritime West Coast and transoceanic trade, in 1874 the Big Four founded a competing line - the California-based Occidental and Oriental Steamship Company. Capitalized at $10 million in stock, the company was jointly controlled by the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroads, which is indicative of how important the prospect of Pacific trade was to these transcontinental railway giants. Leland Stanford served as president of the company during most of its first two decades of operation. The wharves of the Central Pacific were placed at the disposal of the new steamship line free of charge, and steamers were to make runs to and from Asia monthly.
While the two steamship companies were supposedly competitors, a large measure of cooperation obtained in order to ensure predictable, stable profits. For example, each company agreed to offer a monthly transpacific voyage, undertaken at 15-day intervals. Earnings on tea and other through cargoes (those routed from Asia, across the Pacific, and onto trains destined for markets between California and the eastern seaboard) were divided between the railroads and Pacific Mail. Further, the railroads guaranteed to Pacific Mail the profits from at least 600 tons of freight monthly. Lastly, Pacific Mail agreed that its San Francisco wharf could be used by both shipping firms.
The firms used an ever-widening range of routes and ports. In the early years of service, the Occidental and Oriental steamers sailed from San Francisco at the middle of each month (Pacific Mail vessels sailed on the first) en route to Yokohama, and then to Hong Kong. In the 1880s voyages were launched from San Francisco every 10 days. By the early 1890s Honolulu had become a stopover port; not long afterward Manila was added to the transpacific route of both shipping lines. In 1896 the two lines entered the Far East’s coastal
Trade. This resulted in their vessels carrying goods and passengers from Yokohama to Kobe, Nagasaki, and Shanghai before anchoring in Hong Kong. These same ports were revisited on the return voyage to San Francisco.
Regarding crossing times and crews, the Occidental and Oriental ships traversed the Pacific faster than those of Pacific Mail. Steaming from Yokohama to San Francisco usually took 15 or 16 days. Both companies employed Chinese crews, recruited in Hong Kong. They received wages below what would have been paid to whites.
Passengers ranged from those few, usually Anglo-European, in first-class cabins, to the many, most of whom were Chinese, in steerage. Asians carried to the United States sometimes numbered more than 1,000 on a single vessel.
Cargo-carrying was far more profitable than the passenger business. Income from the eastbound Asian trade was more than three times that of the westbound cargo departing from San Francisco. In order of their revenue-generating prospects, the major eastbound commodities included tea, silk, merchandise, rice, burlap sacks, sugar, and opium. In 1899, for example, the Doric dropped anchor in San Francisco with 2,346 bales of raw silk aboard, valued at approximately $2,500,000. Among westbound cargoes, flour was the most lucrative product, followed by silver, Mexican dollars, ginseng (a medicinal herb), and jewelry. In the period 1878-1900 the Occidental and Oriental provided its stockholders an average of a 60 percent return on their investments. So at the same time that the company facilitated through sea and rail traffic between Asia and America’s eastern seaboard, via San Francisco, the shipping line turned a nice profit. California, whose role was pivotal in this maritime-overland interchange, became increasingly Pacific-involved.
World History
