Railroads have been an important part of the early history of our country, long before they reached the midwest where we live. Railroad towns here in our immediate area helped with commerce and travel in a huge way but, when and where did our country’s earliest railroads begin? I recently found some interesting railroad history in the eleventh edition of Association of American Railroads, Washington D.C. January 1956. I found the many facts quite interesting so I will share just a few of them due to limited available space.
The first road of rails in the U.S. is said to have been a short track of wooden rails erected in 1795 on the slope of Beacon Hill in Boston, Mass. to transport brick and other materials used to construct the State House. It operated by horse power. In 1807 an incline railway was built on Beacon Hill by Silas Whitney to transport brick and other kiln products. In 1809 a line only three- fourths of a mile long, west of Philadelphia, PA. was built. About 1811 a short railway was built just south of Richmond, VA and in 1818 a railway was built northeast of Philadelphia, PA. In 1825, a short railway was reported at Nashua, NH. All of these were wooden rail lines and operated with animal power. In 1827 a 9 mile gravity road from a coal mine at Summit Hill to Mauch Chunk opened on the Lehigh River in PA.
Mules hauled the cars to the mine. On the trip down mules rode in cars designed just for them. The story goes the mules became so fond of the ride that they balked at making the down trip on foot.
The first railroad to serve as a public conveyor of passengers and freight was the Baltimore & Ohio. The first revenue passengers were carried on January 7, 1830 a distance of 13 miles. The first common - carrier operated by steam power was the South Carolina Railroad (now part of the southern railway system).
The first U.S. President to travel by railroad was Andrew Jackson, June 6, 1833 on the Baltimore & Ohio from Ellicott’s Mills to Baltimore, Maryland, a distance of 13 miles.
Early locomotives, powered by steam weighed 5 to 10 tons each and were capable of speeds up to 12 to 15 miles per hour.
Many of the railway passenger carriages of the 1830s, bore a striking resemblance to the stagecoaches of that period. The bottom looked like a stagecoach and on top was an open-air “promenade deck” equipped with seats and awning, the last word in passenger train luxury.
Of course two hundred years later, the railroad system , with it’s meager beginnings and growing pains has vastly changed to put it mildly. Like so many modes of transportation, constant change is the name of the game.
