Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1881-01-27
George Stephenson and the LOcOmo-
tive.

George Stephenson was very happy
fellow tending and studying his engine
and my young readers will no doubt be
very much surprised when told that al
eighteen he could not read word. He
could net help it, he never had a chance
to learn. Most of his companions were
in the same condition. Napoleon at
this time was astonishing all Europe
with his brilliant victories in Italy, and
it is stated that young Stephenson would
gather group around his engine fire
and wisely tax some one who could
read little with detailing from scraps
of newspapers what was transpiring in
the great world around them, with great
delight. He became uneasy and wished
to know something; but what could he
do? When at length he was assured
that those wonderful steam engines,
manufactured at Birmingham by Watt
and Fulton, about which he had heard
so much, were fully described in books,
he could stand it no longer. He must
learn to read. But here was a difficulty
of which our young folks in this cOun-
try know little about. There were no
free schools, and he had no time to at
tend them, if there had been. He was
engaged twelve hours day at his work.
He at length found a schoolmaster, not
much OF a teacher, who engaged to in
struct him and few other boys to read
and spell three evenings in week. He
learned to read rapidly, and at nineteen
he could write his own name. AT
length, with another teacher, he COM
menced arithmetic, for which he paid
seven cents a week. The history of his
educational career at this time is ex-
ceedingly interesting. Not a moment
was lost. His teacher would give him
examples, and he would work them out
by his engine fire, and take them to him
in the evening. He had mastered reduc-
tion, while his companions were in sim
pie division. The secret of all his sue
cess was his determination and indus
try.
We must pass over his life rapidly. In
order to make little money he took to
shoe mending, and at length to shoe ma
king, and in this way saved his first five
dollars. He took particular pains in
making neat pair of shoes for farm
er'S daughter, whose name was Fanny.
When he carried them home it was no.
ticed that he took them out of his pocket
several times to look at them. He also
made shoe lasts.
When twenty-one, he married Fanny,
and had saved money enough to COM
mence house keeping in a plain way.
By an accident his clock was injured,
which he repaired so well that all the
people in the neighborhood brought to
him their old clocks to mend. All these
things were done outside his working
hours. He worked at different places in
the neighborhood in business connected
with coliiery engines, always being pro-
NOTED, ,and always saving little money
In two years after his marriage his bright
and beautiful wife died. 1t almost killed
him, he felt his loss SO greatly. He lived
in Scotland year, in which he saved
over 500; but could not stay away from
his little boy, and returned.
He had gIeIt many things to dis
LIE ldtilCl, WIillC llC W dS
away, met with an accident and was
made entirely blind 1t took half of all
the money he had saved to pay his debts,
;nd he then supported him in his neat
little cottage as ling as he lived. He
was then drafted into the army, and it
took all he had left to pay for subSti-
tute. lie then got Il little discouraged
and tried to emigrate to America, but
had not m ney enough, and gave it ur.
In 1900 an important event occurred. |
There were no good engideers in those
days, and the engines were clumsy and
lily constructed. They therefore often |
got out of repair, and no one knew |
enough to fix them. In one of these Ca
ses, all had tried to make an engine |
pump, in vain, and gave it up. Stephen |
son looked at it and said he thought he |
could make it work. He was only what |
they call a brakesman, and the engineers
did not believe it, but let him try. He !
took the engine to pieces, altered it, and |
in four days it was running better than
ever. This affair gave him great name,
and the foreman gave him fifty dollars,
which was the largest sum that he had
ever received at one time, in his life. He
was now busy inventing all sorts of Gu
rious things merely for his own amuse-
ment. He had machine for rocking
the cradle, one for soaring birds from
the fruit trees, a lamp that would burn
under water, and an alarm to wake the
workmen in the morning. HiS cottage
became kind of curiosity shop to the
whole neighbOrhood. j. G. NJ, in vest
'rn Rural.