Mine owner William Sharon (Larry Keating) keeps having his gold shipments held up by a gang of bandits. Sharon hires banker Charles Crocker (Thurston Hall), who happens to have connections in the Central Pacific Railroad, to build a spur line from Virginia City to Carson City, so that the gold can be shipped by railroad. Silent Jeff Kincaid (Randolph Scott) is the railroad engineer. However there is opposition to the railroad, chiefly from another mine owner, Big Jack Davis (Raymond Massey).