Today, I am thankful for the horsepower that propels us forward.
Yesterday, I shared my adoration for a Greek monument – the Parthenon – that still stands nearly two and a half millennia after it was first erected in the city-state of Athens. Throughout the world, incredible edifices stand witness to the ingenuity and perseverance of our former ancestors. The Giza Pyramids, the Roman Coliseum, the Taj Mahal, and the Great Wall of China captivate our imagination of life in eras long gone. However, despite these awe-inspiring architectural achievements, I find it fascinating to consider that the capacity for rapid human travel remained relatively nascent until the early 19th Century. Essentially, prior to the American Revolution, the only natural force humans successfully mastered to propel themselves forward was wind. Explorers learned to navigate the waterways using large sails that would capture the rapid flow of gases on the surface of the water, thereby thrusting their vessels forward towards their desired destination. Yet, the speed by which humans travelled over the oceans and other bodies of water was contingent on wind conditions that were entirely beyond one’s mortal control.
We were less successful when it came to travel on land. Yes, we saddled ourselves on the backs of horses, allowing us to move at a speed commensurate to these amazing four-legged creatures. Amazingly, humans relied on ‘horsepower’ for nearly two thousand millennia. We learned to hitch our multi-wheeled wagons to the backs of several of these majestic creatures at a time, but each pound we added came at a cost to the velocity of movement, especially over dirt-lined, uneven roads. Interestingly, in the early 1500s, Germans began introducing the concept of wagonways, which were primitive wooden rails over which horse-drawn carriages could more easily traverse. Eventually, by the end of the 18th Century, Europe was lined with these wooden rails known as ‘tramways’ to facilitate travel from one town to the next. In due times, wagons would bear flanged wheels grooved to hug these rails, which would over time be replaced with iron for the sake of durability.
However, harnessing energy as a tool for forward progress remained an idle thought until the invention of the steam engine. Until the early 18th Century, wind and water were the only means by which power could be generated to power machines. Yet, in 1712, the first successful steam engine to transmit continuous power was developed in England. Eventually, by the end of the 18th Century, several ingenious individuals, including Richard Trevithick, identified a way by which to use steam in a high-pressured, closed system to generate heat by the burning of coal or some other energy source, which was then directed into a tight cylinder to push a piston. Fastening the piston to a connecting rod attached time several wheels allow for the object to move forward. The more steam one creates, the faster the piston moves, and thus, the faster the wheel would turn. Naturally, such steam engines found an immediate home in the coal mines, or collieries, of England as a tool to transport the daily haul out from underneath the Earth.
However, no one really thought about the potential of human transport until an individual named George Stephenson stepped to the scene. George was not a very learned man, as he was born into an illiterate, working-class family in the Northeastern portion of England. Like his father, he worked in the local colliery where he took a liking to the steam engines, eventually becoming the chief mechanic at the Killingworth colliery. While there, he built his first steam engine, the Bulcher, a machine that was ultimately employed to haul up to 30 tons of coal in 8 large wagons out of the colliery each day.
Then, one day he happened upon another English bloke, Edward Pease. He was an aspiring entrepreneur looking to build a ‘railroad’ in northeastern England to carry the ‘black gold’ from the coal-rich region near Shildon to the local towns of Stockton-on-Tees and Darlington. He was planning to use horses to assist with the transport, when George Stephenson stepped in and offered to build him a ‘locomotive’ steam engine that would rival the ‘worth of fifty horses.’ Pease acquiesced. He founded the public Stockton & Darlington Railroad, powered by Stephenson’s steam engine creation, The Locomotion No. 1. However, the two men quickly came to the realization that their train could carry more than just coal (or other local products, like wool and flour) to the English port towns. They created open-coal wagons that could also carry people on makeshift wooden benches. On this day (Sept 25) in 1825, the 36-wagon train powered by Locomotion No. 1 carried sacks of coal and flour, along with some 450 passengers along the 25-mile route. At an average speed of 8 miles per hour, the first ‘passenger train’ completed its first voyage to Darlington (an 8-mile trip). A few thousand more would follow. By 1830, Stephenson had created a faster engine, known as the Rocket, which could reach speeds close to 35 miles per hour.
Today, Stephenson’s idea has caught on. Some 650,000 miles of railroad has been laid around the world, with train engines powered by modalities beyond steam travelling at more than 200 miles per hour. However, I still get a chuckle that we still reference the power of modern engines based on ‘horsepower.’ Frankly, I hope we never lose ‘track’ of where we started.
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