"Before the steamboat came," began Mr. Ackerman, "you must remember that paddle wheels had long been used, for both the Egyptians and the Romans had built galleys with oars that moved by a windlass turned by the hands of slaves or by oxen. Later there were smaller boats whose paddle wheels were driven by horses. So you see paddle wheels were nothing new; the world was just waiting for something that would turn them around. After the Marquis of Worcester had made his steam fountain he suggested that perhaps this power might be used to propel a boat but unfortunately he died before any experiments with the idea could be made. Various scientists, however, in Spain, France, England and Scotland caught up the plan but after struggling unsuccessfully with it for a time abandoned it as impractical. In 1802 Lord Dundas, a proprietor in one of the English canals, made an encouraging start by using a tow-boat with a paddle wheel at its stern. But alas, this contrivance kicked up such a fuss in the narrow stream that it threatened to tear the banks along the edge all to pieces and therefore it was given up and for ten years afterward there was no more steamboating in England." The boys on the couch chuckled. "In the meantime in America thoughtful men were mulling over the problem of steam navigation. Watt's engine had opened to the minds of inventors endless possibilities; and the success of the early railroads made many persons feel that a new era of science, whose wonders had only begun to unfold, was at hand. In Connecticut there lived a watchmaker by the name of John Fitch, who, although he knew little of the use of steam, knew much about machinery. Through the aid of a company that furnished him with the necessary money he built a steamboat which was tried out in 1787 and made three miles an hour. Of course it was not a boat like any of ours for it was propelled by twelve oars, or paddles, operated by a very primitive steam engine. Nevertheless, it was the forerunner of later and better devices of a similar nature, and therefore Fitch is often credited with being the inventor of the steamboat. Perhaps, had he been able to go on with his schemes, he might have given the world something really significant in this direction; but as it was he simply pointed the way. His money gave out, the company would do nothing further for him, and after building a second boat that could go eight miles an hour instead of three he became discouraged and intemperate and let his genius go to ruin, dying later in poverty--a sad end to a life that might well have been a brilliant one. After Fitch came other experimenters, among them Oliver Evans of Philadelphia who seems to have been a man of no end of inventive vision." "Wasn't he the one who tried sails on a railroad train?" inquired Steve, noting with pleasure the familiar name.