The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1933-08-24


Indians afeot, on horseback, tn .
birchbark canoe and ON dragging travox lead
the way. Close behind them presses the
coming white MANN crealing numbering two
wheeled carts. In Concord stage coaches, In
chaises In Conestoga wagons. in steamboats, and
canalboats, In fast packet boats and swift Yam
kee clipper ships. Now the covered wagons are
rolling out to Oregon and the pony express
rider dashes up and as quickly speeds away.
The pages Of history turn rapidly and the
horse-draWn wagons and carriages are succeeded
by new marvel the "horseless carriage or
automobile. And almost before man has mas
tered this new form Of quick travel across the
land, the Wrlghts leap up from the sand dunes
Of Kitty Hawk In North Carolina. and the dream
OF Icarus Is reality. Man Is now travelling
through the air
In the midst of all this splendid pageantry OF
the conquest of water land and air there is one
chapter which stirs your imagination as perhaps
no other one does That Is the Parade of the
Iron Horse" You view approximately the his
torically authentic costumes Of more than a
hundred actors In the pageant. You are amused
and delighted by the pantomime OF some of these
actors as they reproduce the thoughts and feel
ings and actions OF past generations OF Amer
leans. And at times you are deeply stirred as
you say to yourself Il am seeing history In the
making"
But when those locomotives from Peter Coo
per's little Tom Thumb" on down to one OF the
modern Tltans. come rolling across the stage
with ringing bells, putting smokestacks and
screaming whistles then--ah, them It's hard
for you to stife that little-boy urge to stand up
and yell For In these black monsters you see
the inventive genius OF America; you see the
symbol of the final conquest OF the wilderness;
you see the instrument which first bound to-
OF America: you see whole century OF the
development of the machine age.
The first "iron horse" paradoxically enough,
was more horse than iron. The first railroad
built In America for carrying passengers and
freight the Baltimore 4 Ohio Chartered In
1927 1t began laying the rails for Its 10 miles
OF road from Baltimore to EllIcotts Mills on
July d. 1923, with Charles Carroll OF Carroll
ton, the only living signer Of the Declaration
OF Independence. lifting the first shovelfu of
dirt. incidentally. this historic Is graphic
ally reproduced In the Baltimore & Oho's ex-
hibit In the Travel and Transport buiIdlng)
The road was opened in May, 1890 In the
meantime the promoters had been experiment
Ing with various sorts Of cars. One was horse
drawn passenger car. (Such as is shown In Illus
traton No. above.) Another was fiat car
fitted with treadmill operated by horse but
upon Its trial trip 1t came to grief-a cow on
the track upset 1t Another experiment, which
was also unsuccessful was made with sail
boat on wheels, called the Meteor
Then the inventive genius OF Peter Cooper
came into the picture. He built tiny locomotive
with boiler about the size OF the which
stands behind your kitchen stove and with hues
made Of gun barrels To this he gave the ap-
propriate name of "Tom Thumb" and made some
trial runs on the partly-fnshed railroad in 1890.
From this experience he reconstructed his To-
connective and on August %. $780, the "Tom
Thumb" pushed instead of pulled, car with
"a passengers over the entire ID miles Of the
road attaining a speed Of four miles an hour.
few days later occurred the famous race
between the "Tom Thumb and horse drawn
car over the double track between Baltimore &
Ellicotts Mills. AT the start the gray horse
leaped into the lead and held 1t for awhile. Then
the putting "Tom Thumb began to catch up
1t drew abreast the straining animal-then
passed It. But just as shouts Of triumph went
up from Coopers passengers belt slipped on
the mechanism OF "Tom Thumbs SO the gray
horse won the race to Baltimore.
But despite this victory the officials of the
new railroad had enough confidence In the flu
ture of steam locomotives to offer prize OF
$4,000 for the best engine which should be de-
lyered to the road for trial before June J. 1881.
This prize was by Phineas Davis of York,
Pa, a matchmaker! He called his locomotive
the york" but the pioneer railroad men took