Inventions in the centuryDoolittle, William H. (William Henry)
History
Inventions in the century
Doolittle, William H. (William Henry)
Inventions
century of steam power were in the line of road engines.
On Christmas eve of 1801, Trevithick made the initial trip with the
first successful steam road locomotive through the streets of Camborne
in Cornwall, carrying passengers. In one of his trips he passed into the
country roads and came to a tollgate through which a frightened keeper
hastily passed him without toll, hailing him as the devil.
Persistent efforts continued to be made to introduce a practical steam
road carriage in England until 1827. After Trevithick followed
Blenkinsop, who made a locomotive which ran ten miles an hour. Then came
Julius Griffith, in 1821, of Brompton, who patented a steam carriage
which was built by Joseph Bramah, one of the ablest mechanics of his
time. Gordon, Brunton and Gurney attempted a curious and amusing steam
carriage, resembling a horse in action--having jointed legs and feet,
but this animal was not successful. Walter Hancock, in 1827, was one of
the most persistent and successful inventors in this line; but bad roads
and an unsympathetic public discouraged inventors in their efforts to
introduce steam road carriages, and their attention was turned to the
locomotive to run on rails or tracks especially prepared for them.
Wooden and iron rails had been introduced a century before for heavy
cars and wagons in pulling loads from mines and elsewhere, but when at
the beginning of the century it had been found that the engines of Watt
could be used to drag such loads, it was deemed necessary to make a rail
having its top surface roughened with ridges and the wheels of the
engine and cars provided with teeth or cogs to prevent anticipated
slipping.
In England, Blackett and George Stephenson discovered that the adhesion
of smooth wheels to smooth rails was sufficient. Without overlooking the
fact that William Hendley built and operated a locomotive called the
_Puffing Billy_ in 1803, and Hackworth one a little later, yet to the
genius of Stephenson is due chiefly the successful introduction of the
modern locomotive. His labours and inventions continued from 1812 for
twenty years, and culminated at two great trials: the first one on the
Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1829, when he competed with
Hackworth and Braithwaite and Ericsson, and with the _Rocket_ won the
race; and the second at the opening of the same road in 1830, when with
the _Northumbrian_, at the head of seven other locomotives and a long
train of twenty-eight carriages, in which were seated six hundred
passengers, he ran the train successfully between the two towns.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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