Evening star., 1909-07-17
SUCCESS OF FULTON
Put Steam Navigation on a
Commercial Basis.
TRIP OF THE clERMONT
Undertaking Financed by Robert Z.
Livingston.
SENSATION OF THE TIMES
Enthusiasm Of the Crowds That
Witnessed the First Steamboat
Traverse the Hudson.
SENSATION OF THE TIMES
BY WILLIAM E. CURTIS.

BY WILLIAM E. CURTIS.
Special Correspondence Of The Star and the
Chicago Record Herald.
ALBANY, n. Y, July 1s, 1909.
While Robert Fulton was not the in
ventor of steam navigation, he was the
first to make 1t a commercial success
He was a man of great genius; an
artist as well as an inventor, and when
he was a boy his alertness of mind and
ingenuity were remarkable. He was a
descendant of Rev. Robert Fulton, chap
lain to Lady Arabella Stuart. daughter
of the Earl Of Lennox, who was an uncle
of James /. Because she married Will
liam Seymour, Marquis OF Hertford, who
was obnoxious to Queen Elizabeth. she
was committed to the tower, where she
ended her days. Her chaplain went to
Ireland and settled near Kilkenny,
whence, 125 years later, descendant OF
the same name, having reached manhood
emigrated to America, married Mary
Smith, who was also Of Irish descent
and bought farm in Lancaster county,
Pa.
Their son, Robert, was born November
like other boys he never seemed to
care to play. He invented the Roman
candle, which is made OF gunpowder
and sheets Of pastebOard, when he was
thirteen years old. When he was four
teen he invented an apparatus, turned by
crank. to propel a fat boat with pad
die wheels When he was seventeen his
mother apprenticed him to jeweler
where he spent his spare time in study
ing art and earned enough money by
painting portraits and miniatures to buy
a farm in Washington county, for his
family. and pay his own passage to
England. where he had arranged to study
art under Benjamin West. The two men
member of Vests family for several
years. and they painted each others por-
traits. Few of Fuhon's paintings have
come down to us, but they must have
traits accepted for exhibition at the
Royal Academy.
He abandoned art at the instance of the
Duke of Bridgewater. at that time Cne of
the foremost men in England. and became
a civil engineer assisting in the construc-
ton OF a canal. At Birmingham he met
Lord StanhOpe and John Watt the in
,ventor of the steam engine. With them
he undertook experiments for moving
ships by means of steam" He also in
vented device to supersede locks on ca
mails by the use of inclined planes; he OBJ
tanned patents for a machine for saving
and polishing marble machine for spin
ming flax; another for weaving ropes. a
boats, and submarine torpedo. which
took him to France because the British
naval authorities declined to consider it.
This consisted of copper canister filled
with gunpowder to be discharged by
clockWork. He also invented a submarine
boat propelled by hand engine and sup
piled with compressed air in a copper
globe. and actually navigated the boat for
four hours and a half under water at q
depth of twenty feet
Fulton's Paris Disappointment.
When he went to Paris he took letters
of introduction to Joel Barlow, who was
then United States minister there. This
led to an intimacy that lasted lifetime.
Fulton lived in Barlow's family for seven
years; Barlow's poem, 1.-The Columbiad,"
probably the greatest epic ever written
by an American, was dedicated to Fulton
and was originally published at Fulton's
expense.
little cyclone that did considerable
damage in Paris in 1903 changed the ca
reer of Robert Fulton and sent him back
to America. Otherwise he might have be-
come a permanent citizen Of France. And
indeed even greater possibilities were in
voved in that incident, because IL a
steamboat which Fulton had constructed
for the inspection of Napoleon Bonaparte
had not been wrecked that night his plans
might have been adopted, France might
have become the mistress Of the seas by
the application of Fulton's inventions to
her Warships.
The late Lord Acton declared that the
sinking of Fulton's boat in the Seine
was the most important event in the
nineteenth century, because otherwise 1t
might have changed the map Of the
world.
Robert r. Livingston succeeded Joel
Barlow as minister to France and In
herited from his predecessor an intimacy
and an appreciation of Fulton's genius.
Livingston had furnished the money to
build the experimental steamboat for
Napoleon, and when the French marine
authorities refused to give the matter
further attention he induced Fulton to re-
turn to the United States and continue
his experiments on the Hudson river at
his Uivingstons) expense.
Fulton Comes to America.
An engine was built by Boulton & Watt
at Birmingham from specifications fur
nished by Fulton. and the latter sailed
for New York. Livingston had already
furnished means to other inventors for
the same purpose and had obtained from
the legislature a monopoly for the navf-
CATION on the waters of New York state
for twenty years by steam before his
departure for France. But the grant
rested upon the stipulation that he should
complete and operate a steamboat with
in two years. Livingston therefore enter
ed into partnership with Fulton to under
take to comply with these conditions,
which an Englshman named Nesbit, en-
ployed by him for that purpose, had
failed to do.
Fulton never claimed to be the inventor
of the steamboat. but was first to build
one that was commercially successful.
Several SpaniardS and Frenchmen and at
least six Americans had previously fail
ed in the attempt. James Rumsey COM
pleted a steamboat and actually operated
it on the Delaware in the summer of
1870. John Fitch had steamboat on
the Connecticut river. and other invent
Clermont, SO named In honor of Chan
cellor Livingston's home opposite King
ston, on the Hudson, was the first vessel
to be navigated by steam on regular
route without interruption.
The Clermont was built i'll the shipyard
of Charles Brown on East river, New
York city; it cost about $4,000, and in
appearance would be considered a mon
strosity today. The public will have a
chance to compare her with modern
steamboats, when the replica, now being
constructed, comes out to take her place
at the head OF the naval parade in Sep
tember
The Clermont was 40 feet long. thir-
teen feet wide seven feet deep and drew
two feet of water. Her bottom was
fat with no keel and she had steering
boards to prevent her from drifting side
ways. The engine. made by James Watt
in England. was amidship between the
two cabins. and uncovered. The boiler
was of copper: the paddlewheels were
fifteen feet in diameter, and when Full
ton wanted to turn his boat around he
disconnected one of them. During the
winter of 1sO7s. after her first appear