Transportation - Overview
Americans have always been a people on the move—on rails, roads, and waterways (for travel through the air, visit the National Air and Space Museum). In the transportation collections, railroad objects range from tools, tracks, and many train models to the massive 1401, a 280-ton locomotive built in 1926. Road vehicles include coaches, buggies, wagons, trucks, motorcycles, bicycles, and automobiles—from the days before the Model T to modern race cars. The accessories of travel are part of the collections, too, from streetlights, gas pumps, and traffic signals to goggles and overcoats.
In the maritime collections, more than 7,000 design plans and scores of ship models show the evolution of sailing ships and other vessels. Other items range from scrimshaw, photographs, and marine paintings to life jackets from the Titanic.
"Transportation - Overview" showing 5 items.
Steam Locomotive, John Bull
- Description
- Knowing the best locomotives were made in England, Robert Stevens ordered one from Robert Stevenson & Company of New Castle for the Camden and Amboy Railroad which ran across central New Jersey. The "John Bull," named later for the mythical gentleman who symbolized England, was the result.
- The locomotive was built as a standard 0-4-0 Planet class. Never seeing a locomotive before, Isaac Dripps, a young steamboat mechanic, assembled the engine from the parts that arrived in New Jersey in September 1831. It was tested that same month. The locomotive proved vulnerable to derailment. Dripps installed an extra pair of wheels, carried in a frame out front. Stevens called them "guide wheels"; they helped to steer the locomotive in curves and over uneven rails. The innovation worked so well that the Camden and Amboy bought 15 American copies of "John Bull" with the added wheels. By the end of the 1830s, American manufacturers were building locomotives and exporting to Russia and other countries that had vast terrain much like America.
- The steam locomotive "John Bull" ran for 35 years, pulling trains of passengers and cargo between the two largest cities of the time, Philadelphia and New York. A short ferry ride connected Camden with Philadelphia and a longer ferry run connected South Amboy with New York. The locomotive propelled trains at 25 to 30 miles per hour.
- Date made
- 1831
- user
- Camden and Amboy Railroad
- Stevens, Robert
- assembled by
- Dripps, Isaac
- maker
- Robert Stephenson and Company
- ID Number
- TR*180001
- accession number
- 15804
- catalog number
- 180001
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Locomotive model, "Brother Jonathan"
- Description
- This is a model of a small and relatively unknown locomotive that is actually one of the most important benchmarks in American railway engineering. The "Brother Jonathan" was the first engine to have a leading truck. It was more than a short-lived prototype because it remained in regular service over twenty years.
- It was completed for the Mohawk and Hudson in mid-1832 by the West Point Foundry to a design furnished by John B. Jervis. This contract price for the engine, less tender, was $4,600. Its designer apparently based the plan on what he felt were the better designs of Robert Stephenson, a British locomotive builder. The boiler, valve gear and crank axle bear a strong resemblance to those parts of the Stephenson locomotives. However, Jervis recognized the need for a more flexible running gear and so radically changed the four square, rigid British plan by introducing a leading truck. This idea proved wonderfully effective, as already noted, but Jervis' design for a coal burning boiler proved less than successful. It would be many years before hard coal was regularly used for locomotive fuel. In the winter of 1833 a new deep and narrow wood burning firebox and a wire screened hood over the top of the smoke stack were added. The engine's name, originally the "Experiment," was probably changed at this time to "Brother Jonathan."
- Even in its original state the engine performed well. An employee of the West Point Foundry tested the engine for speed in August of 1832 with remarkable results. He said she was the "fastest and steadiest engine I have ever run...." Fourteen miles, including one stop for water, was made in thirteen minutes, and one mile was clocked in only 45 seconds. In the time when the horse was man's fastest courier, this test was miraculous. Yet surely these racing trips were rare because trains on the Mohawk and Hudson were operated at 19 mph in respect to safety and economy.
- The locomotive was rebuilt and enlarged in 1846 as an eight wheel engine and either sold or retired around 1853.
- Location
- Currently on loan
- date made
- 1967
- maker
- Severn-Lamb Ltd.
- ID Number
- TR*335608
- catalog number
- 335608
- accession number
- 1977.0358
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Model of the Steam Locomotive, Puffing Billy
- Description
- This is a 1-1/2" scale model of the Puffing Billy, a locomotive built in 1813-1814 by William Hedley, superintendent of the Wylam Colliery near Newcastle, England. The model shows a horizontal boiler, two verticle cylinders and two rocking beams.
- Hauling 50 tons at its normal operating speed of 5 mph, the locomotive did the work of ten horses at considerably less cost. Hedley’s success helped establish the locomotive as an economic and practical machine. The Puffing Billy was retired in 1862 and may now be seen at the Science Museum in London.
- Location
- Currently on loan
- date made
- 1957-1958
- Puffing Billy locomotive constructed
- 1813-1814
- maker
- Holden, E. H.
- ID Number
- TR*316652
- catalog number
- 316652
- accession number
- 224752
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Model of the 1837 Steam Locomotive, H. R. Dunham
- Description
- This is a 1/2 inch scale model of the engine and tender that represent the general service locomotive, Dunham built around 1837 by H. R. Dunham & Co. of New York City for the Harlem Rail Road. Contemporary drawings reveal that Dunham closely followed Baldwin’s Lancaster design. The locomotive model shows a 4-2-0 wheel arrangment. Steam locomotives are often classified by wheel arrangement, in the order of leading, driving, and trailing wheels. This engine has four leading wheels, two driving wheels, and no trailing wheels.
- The proliferation of new railroads encouraged many small machine shops to enter the locomotive business. While some of these firms, like that of M. W. Baldwin, would produce many engines and make a fortune, most, like H.R. Dunham & Co., built only a few machines and went out of business. Dunham constructed sixteen locomotives from 1836 to 1838 for the New York and Harlem, the Camden and Amboy, the Michigan Central and several other lines.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1961
- maker
- Severn Lamb, Ltd.
- ID Number
- TR*319306
- catalog number
- 319306
- accession number
- 234646
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Model of the 1839 Steam Locomotive, Gowan & Marx
- Description
- This is a 1/2" scale model of the Gowan and Marx, a 4-4-0 freight locomotive built in 1839 for the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. The model consists of an engine with two inclinded cylinders, horizontal boiler, a domed firebox and a four wheel tender.
- As trains grew longer and heavier, railroad companies needed more powerful locomotives. One way to increase power was to build machines with more driving wheels, or powered wheels. However, such locomotives had previously proved too rigid for the rough tracks of early American railroads, derailing often or damaging the track. On the Gowan and Marx, locomotive builders Eastwick and Harrison of Philadelphia introduced the equalizing lever, a spring suspension that distributed the engine’s weight over three points. In this arrangement, each of the four driving wheels could bounce independently as the engine negotiated rough track, greatly improving stability and traction. According to John H. White in American Locomotives: 1830-1880, the equalizing lever, which allowed the successful operation of engines with multiple pairs of driving wheels, “was possibly the most important American contribution to locomotive design.” Eastwick and Harrison’s equalizing lever proved so successful that it was used through the end of steam locomotive construction in the 1950s.
- Steam locomotives are often classified by wheel arrangement, in the order of leading, driving, and trailing wheels. The Gowan and Marx has four leading wheels, four driving wheels, and no trailing wheels. It is therefore classified as a 4-4-0 locomotive. When compared to an earlier 4-2-0 type engine, like Baldwin’s Lancaster, the 4-4-0’s additional pair of driving wheels brought a great increase in power. Intended for slow speed, heavy coal trains, the Gowan and Marx performed extremely well; on one occasion, it pulled a 101-car train of 423 tons at an average speed of 9.8 miles per hour. After 1840, the 4-4-0 or “American type” became the most popular locomotive in the country. The exceptional performance of the Gowan and Marx greatly enhanced the reputation of Eastwick and Harrison. They were subsequently invited to Russia to build locomotives for the Moscow and St. Petersburg Railway.
- Location
- Currently on loan
- date made
- 1962
- Gowan & Marx locomotive constructed
- 1839
- maker
- Shawcraft (Models) Ltd.
- ID Number
- TR*320630
- accession number
- 242186
- catalog number
- 320630
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center