Union Pacific, the blockbuster of 1939

After the success of The Plainsman at the box office, Paramount did not hesitate to spend 1.45 million dollars on Cecil B. DeMille’s next western epic, Union Pacific, released in 1939.

Based on Ernest Haycox’s 1936 novel Trouble Shooter, the film explored the enormous task of building the transcontinental railroad during the late 1860s. DeMille and his producers loved filming in southern Utah’s varied topography, where they could shoot scenes of prairies, deserts, mountains and canyons within the same production schedule.

Crews constructed a replica of Cheyenne, Wyoming, as it appeared in the 1860s near Iron Springs, Utah. Hundreds of extras portrayed laborers laying rails while locomotives billowed smoke and steam nearby. An Indian attack sequence was staged outside Cedar City.

The famous driving of the golden spike commemorating completion of the railroad took place May 10, 1869, at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory. DeMille’s version of the ceremony, however, was filmed in California.

Barbara Stanwyck starred as Mollie Monahan, a postmistress and daughter of a locomotive engineer. Joel McCrea played railroad troubleshooter Jeff Butler, battling profiteers obstructing completion of the railroad for financial gain. Robert Preston played Dick Allen, Butler’s rival in both business and romance.

Stanwyck’s career spanned more than four decades. Her later television role as ranching matriarch Victoria Barkley in The Big Valley introduced her to a new generation of viewers. McCrea became one of Hollywood’s enduring western stars, while Preston later gained fame for his stage and screen work in The Music Man.

Released in 1939, Union Pacific was DeMille’s final black-and-white film and the last movie he made in Little Hollywood. Running about 135 minutes, it topped The Plainsman at the box office by more than a half-million dollars.