The dossier
The architect of the iron horse
Thomas Durant views the construction of the railroad not as a triumph of human engineering, but as a massive, unprecedented opportunity for personal enrichment and political power.
Colm Meaney plays the historical figure with towering, theatrical menace. He is a master manipulator who justifies his horrific cruelty and endless corruption as the necessary cost of building a nation.
He is the primary antagonist of Hell on Wheels. Durant represents the dark, bloody reality of American expansionism, a man who built the future using the broken bodies of the men who laid the track.