Railways: from Locomotion to the golden spike

At the Rainhill trials in October 1829, Stephenson’s Rocket averaged 12 miles per hour, reached 30, and won its builders a prize of £500.

Rails before locomotives

Railways began as wagonways in coal country. For two centuries horses had pulled coal wagons along wooden, and later iron, rails from pits to rivers and harbours, because a wheel on a smooth rail rolls far more easily than on a muddy road. In 1804 Richard Trevithick ran a steam locomotive on an ironworks tramway in south Wales, and in the next twenty years engineers in the northeast of England, among them George Stephenson, built locomotives to haul coal at collieries. They were slow, heavy and often broke the brittle rails, and many people doubted that they would ever beat horses or stationary engines that hauled wagons on ropes.

Stockton and Darlington, 1825

The Stockton and Darlington Railway was built to carry coal from the pits of County Durham to the river Tees. On 27 September 1825 its opening train set off: twelve wagons of coal were first hauled up a slope by a stationary engine, and then Locomotion No. 1, built by Robert Stephenson and Company of Newcastle, pulled the train from Shildon through Darlington to Stockton, with hundreds of passengers riding in wagons and one coach. It was the first time a steam locomotive had hauled a passenger train on a public railway. For years afterwards, though, most passenger services on the line were still pulled by horses.

Rainhill and Rocket

The Liverpool and Manchester Railway, planned to link the port of Liverpool with the cotton mills of Manchester, was designed from the start for passengers as well as goods. Its directors could not agree whether to use locomotives or stationary engines, so in 1829 they offered a prize of £500 for “the most improved locomotive engine”. The trials were held over nine days in October 1829 on a level stretch at Rainhill, outside Liverpool; more than 10,000 people came to watch on the first day. Five locomotives took part: Cycloped, Novelty, Perseverance, Sans Pareil and Rocket. Rocket, designed by Robert Stephenson, was the only one to complete the trials. It averaged 12 miles per hour and reached a top speed of 30, and the Stephensons won the prize and the contract to build engines for the line.

A world joined by rails

Within twenty years Britain had thousands of miles of railway, and lines spread across Europe and North America. Railways carried coal, cotton, food and newspapers, and let people make in a few hours trips that had taken days by coach. Towns had kept their own local time, set by the sun, but a railway timetable needed one time for the whole line, and British railways adopted London time. In the United States, the Central Pacific Railroad built east from Sacramento, California, and the Union Pacific built west from Omaha, Nebraska. Chinese immigrant workers did much of the hardest work on the Central Pacific through the Sierra Nevada. On 10 May 1869 the two lines met at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory, and a ceremonial golden spike marked the first railway across the continent.