Steam locomotiveIn 1829, the first steam locomotive for railroad use in the U.S., the Stourbridge Lion, made its first run in America. It travelled at 10 m.p.h. on the wooden tracks faced with wrought iron that already existed as a gravity railway, used to carry coal from mines at Carbondale to the canal terminus at Honesdale, Pennsylvania. The 7-ton engine was built by Foster, Rastrick & Co., of Stourbridge, England for the Hudson Railroad Company to specifications drawn up by John Bloomfield Jervis, chief engineer for the Delaware and Hudson Canal project. However, after the trials, it was deemed to be too heavy for continued use hauling loads of coal on those tracks.«[Image: replica of the Stourbridge Lion built at the Delaware and Hudson Railroad's Colonie Shops, NY, in 1933] |
