Do Americans recognize the contribution of those who built America?

Question:

Do Americans recognize the contribution of those who built America?

Not just the obvious answers like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, etc. etc.

I mean people like the Irish and Chinese who built the railroad, Japanese and Chinese who built the aqueducts, blacks who built the economy by working for free, mexicans who fed the country...etc. etc.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: sadly no we don't. In school we learn a lot about the slaves and what not but I don't think that we fully understand what those people went through. As for the Chinese and the Irish immigrants...there is like one paragraph in any textbook that I have ever read. Teachers aren't told to teach students about what the Irish and Chinese had to go through when they were helping with the railroad so it's overlooked and kids are left totally unaware.