The history of the first locomotives in America. From original ...

ROSS WINANS'S IMPROVEMENTS. 105
main axle revolved. This was tlie ne phis ultra of tlie
friction-vrlieel, and Mr. Winans became immortalized.
B. H. Latrobe, Esq., describes a scene in one of tlie tipper
rooms of tlie Baltimore Exchange, where the vener-
able Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who was the great
man, on all important occasions, was seated in a little
railroad car, drawn by a small weight attached to a
string passing over a pulley and dropping into the hall
below. Around him were all the prominent men of
Baltimore ; all were as much pleased as children with a
new toy. In fact, there was a verdant freshness about
all railroad objects in those days which it is wonderful
to conceive in this period of advance and improvement.
Not only was friction sought to be avoided, but all
s6rts of experiments were tried, to improve the road.*
To ride in a railroad-car, in those days, was literally
to go " thundering " along. The roll of the wheel was
hammering the iron rails out of existence. When this
became known, after tens of thousands of dollars had
been thrown away, one of the directors, a man, too, of
general information, proposed to lay a thin slab of lead
between the iron and the stone, to relieve the concussion.
Luckily, this costly experiment, which would
have furnished the sportsmen of the interior with slugs
and bullets without cost, was not carried into effect.
"We only mention this now, to show how crude were
the notions of the wisest men, touching raiboads in .their
infancy, in this country, and to indicate the obstacles
our forefathers had to contend with in the early days
of their construction. With no example before them
to follow, with no experience before them to govern,
every thing had to be tested by actual experiment.
* Iron strips were laid, for miles and miles, on stone curbs, on the Baltimore and
Ohio Railroad.
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