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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(micro)
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Growing up in California, one of my earliest interests was the Transcontinental Railroad. Built in the 1860s right after the Civil War, it was this country’s first rail line to completely cross the nation. While several railroads had built tracks from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River, and there was even some line from San Francisco to Sacramento, there was a 2,000 mile gap in the United States’ railroads. Thus came into being a Transcontinental Railroad, bridging the gap from Sacramento to Omaha.
Recently I remembered how much I had loved the Transcontinental Railroad, and how much fun it would be to do a puzzle cache on it. So here it is, have fun! :)
The co-ordinates listed above are bogus. The actual co-ords to this cache are as follows:
N 35 AB.CDE
W 085 FG.HIJ
To fill in the missing co-ordinates, you must successfully answer the following questions. (For example, if you choose “California Pacific and United Pacific” for question A, you would replace “A” in the co-ords above with “2”.)
If you do not know an answer to a question, I would recommend searching around on either Google or Wikipedia; you can find all the answers there.
A. What were the names of the two railroad companies that together built the Transcontinental Railroad?
1-Southern Pacific and Union Pacific
0-Central Pacific and Union Pacific
2-California Pacific and United Pacific
B. Charles Crocker, Collis Huntington, Mark Hopkins, and Leland Stanford were commonly known as the…
4-Big Four
5-Fab Four
6-Da Four
C. Which gigantic mountain range did the CP have to cross?
9-Sierra Nevadas
8-Rockies
7-Appalachians
D. Who was the principal surveyor for the CP?
1-Grenville Dodge
3-Thomas Durant
2-Theodore Judah
E. What states did the Transcontinental Railroad go through?
3-California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Kansas
4-California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma
1-California, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska
F. From which city did the UP start building its’ lines west?
0-Omaha, Nebraska
1-Council Bluffs, Iowa
2-Independence, Kansas
G. Who was the president of the UP?
2-Mark Hopkins
4-Thomas Durant
3-Grenville Dodge
H. Where did the two railroads finally meet?
0-Promontory Point, Utah
5-Ogden, Utah
6-Salt Lake City, Utah
I. When was the final ceremony commemorating the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad?
1-May 8, 1867
0-May 10, 1869
2-July 20, 1969
J. What was the final spike called?
6-The Silver Spike
2-The Golden Spike
8-The Final Spike
The actual cache, not far away at all, is a magnetic keyholder. Once the correct coordinates have been found, this should be a very easy park-n-grab cache. BYOP, use stealth (as always), and please replace as found. Have fun (toot, toot)!
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
yvsg hc