Year: 1876

George SJepensOn, who is now just
! ly called the "father of railways" was
the child OF poor parents in England.
Unable to send him to school, they
employed him at home as a nurse for
the younger children until he was
eight years old. His chief duty as
nurse was to keep his little brothers
and sisters from under the hOofs of
the horses which drew the coal cars
on the "tramwayn wooden rail-
road leading from a coal-mine. which
ran near his fathers door. At this
early age, while Watching the c1al-
trains passing, he conceived the idea
that iron would make better rails
than wood, and that if he could put
upon wheels the steaD-sngine which
his father tended as fireman at the
coal-pit, il could be made to draw as
heavy a train of eoal-cars as could be
moved by a great team OF fifty
horses.


The idea did not pass away from
the brain of George Stephenson when
he was removed from his home at
nine years of age, and hired out, 9t
four cents day, to tend the cows OF
a neighborIng farmer. He had enough
of leisure while watching the herd in
the field to think over the subject
He even built him Sn engine OF clay,
with hemIoek branches for steam
pipss. 1 suspect that, like Little Boy
Blue, he sometimes let the cows
astray into forbidden meadows while
he sat thinking about engines on
wheels and roads of iron. He could
not study about them in books for
two very good reasons In the first
place, no books about railroads and
locomotives had been printed, since
neither had been built The other
reason was that George Stephenson
couldn't read at all. He did not know
his alphabet until he was Nineteen
years old.


Little George, or "GeOrdy," as the
common people nieknamed him, was
uext employed to drive the morse
which turned the winding machine
or "gin," as the eolliers called 1t, at
the cOal-pit where his father worked.
He tEen began to think of plan for
making the steam dc the work of the
horse, and one day astonisked the col
liers by building on bench, in front
of his fathers cottage, a model in clay
of an engine which turned the ''ginr
and lifted the coal. He was at this
time so young ard small that his
father made him hide WREN the own
er of the coal-mine went 1.-THE rounds"
to pay his hands, for fear he should
think him too small to receive six
teen cents day wages.


1t was not until he was ninuteen
years old, and was set to watch an
engine, that be found time 10 attend
school and learn to read and write.
He worked steadily at bis old idea for
twenty-five years. He made the first
locomotive with smooth driving
wheels. 1t had been thought neces-
sary py some engineers TO construct
locomotives with cogged driving-
wheels, and corresponding rack on
the rail, to prevent the wheels from
Slipping. Bat Stephenson successful
ly set aside all these contrivances.
He was nearly fifty years old before
he found men willing TO risk their
money in constructing an iron rail-
road to test his locomotive. When,
at length, the first railroad was COM
pleted between Stockton and Dar-
lingtOn, two English towns only
twelve miles apart the procession
with which the day was celebrated
was headed by man on horseback,
to keep the road clear for Stephen
sons locomotive and ear, and ladies
and gentlemen on horseback and in
carriages kept pscs with the train by
riding by the side of the track. But
after the procession had proceeded a
short distance, Stephenson, who was
running his own engine, impatIently
called to the horseman to get out Of
the way, and, putting steam on, he
ran his locomotive the rest of the dis
tanc9 at the terrible pace of twelve
miles an hour :