chapter18.txt

CHAPTER XVIII







THE ELECTRIC RAILWAY







EDISON had no sooner designed his dynamo in



1879 than he adopted the same form of machine



for use as a motor. The two are shown in the Scientific



American of October 18, 1879, and are alike, except



that the dynamo is vertical and the motor lies in a



horizontal position, the article remarking: "Its construction



differs but slightly from the electric generator."



This was but an evidence of his early appreciation



of the importance of electricity as a motive power;



but it will probably surprise many people to know



that he was the inventor of an electric motor before



he perfected his incandescent lamp. His interest in



the subject went back to his connection with General



Lefferts in the days of the evolution of the stock



ticker. While Edison was carrying on his shop at



Newark, New Jersey, there was considerable excitement



in electrical circles over the Payne motor, in



regard to the alleged performance of which Governor



Cornell of New York and other wealthy capitalists



were quite enthusiastic. Payne had a shop in Newark,



and in one small room was the motor, weighing perhaps



six hundred pounds. It was of circular form,



incased in iron, with the ends of several small magnets



sticking through the floor. A pulley and belt, con-



nected to a circular saw larger than the motor,



permitted large logs of oak timber to be sawed with ease



with the use of two small cells of battery. Edison's



friend, General Lefferts, had become excited and was



determined to invest a large sum of money in the



motor company, but knowing Edison's intimate



familiarity with all electrical subjects he was wise



enough to ask his young expert to go and see the



motor with him. At an appointed hour Edison went



to the office of the motor company and found there



the venerable Professor Morse, Governor Cornell,



General Lefferts, and many others who had been



invited to witness a performance of the motor. They



all proceeded to the room where the motor was at



work. Payne put a wire in the binding-post of the



battery, the motor started, and an assistant began



sawing a heavy oak log. It worked beautifully, and so



great was the power developed, apparently, from the



small battery, that Morse exclaimed: "I am thankful



that I have lived to see this day." But Edison



kept a close watch on the motor. The results were



so foreign to his experience that he knew there was



a trick in it. He soon discovered it. While holding



his hand on the frame of the motor he noticed a



tremble coincident with the exhaust of an engine



across the alleyway, and he then knew that the



power came from the engine by a belt under the floor,



shifted on and off by a magnet, the other magnets



being a blind. He whispered to the General to put



his hand on the frame of the motor, watch the



exhaust, and note the coincident tremor. The General



did so, and in about fifteen seconds he said: "Well,



Edison, I must go now. This thing is a fraud." And



thus he saved his money, although others not so



shrewdly advised were easily persuaded to invest by



such a demonstration.







A few years later, in 1878, Edison went to Wyoming



with a group of astronomers, to test his tasimeter during



an eclipse of the sun, and saw the land white to harvest.



He noticed the long hauls to market or elevator



that the farmers had to make with their loads of grain



at great expense, and conceived the idea that as ordinary



steam-railroad service was too costly, light



electric railways might be constructed that could



be operated automatically over simple tracks, the



propelling motors being controlled at various points.



Cheap to build and cheap to maintain, such roads would



be a great boon to the newer farming regions of the



West, where the highways were still of the crudest character,



and where transportation was the gravest difficulty



with which the settlers had to contend. The



plan seems to have haunted him, and he had no sooner



worked out a generator and motor that owing to their



low internal resistance could be operated efficiently,



than he turned his hand to the practical trial of such



a railroad, applicable to both the haulage of freight



and the transportation of passengers. Early in 1880,



when the tremendous rush of work involved in the



invention of the incandescent lamp intermitted a little,



he began the construction of a stretch of track



close to the Menlo Park laboratory, and at the same



time built an electric locomotive to operate over it.







This is a fitting stage at which to review briefly



what had been done in electric traction up to that



date. There was absolutely no art, but there had



been a number of sporadic and very interesting



experiments made. The honor of the first attempt of



any kind appears to rest with this country and with



Thomas Davenport, a self-trained blacksmith, of



Brandon, Vermont, who made a small model of a



circular electric railway and cars in 1834, and



exhibited it the following year in Springfield, Boston,



and other cities. Of course he depended upon



batteries for current, but the fundamental idea was



embodied of using the track for the circuit, one rail



being positive and the other negative, and the motor



being placed across or between them in multiple arc



to receive the current. Such are also practically the



methods of to-day. The little model was in good



preservation up to the year 1900, when, being shipped



to the Paris Exposition, it was lost, the steamer that



carried it foundering in mid-ocean. The very broad



patent taken out by this simple mechanic, so far



ahead of his times, was the first one issued in America



for an electric motor. Davenport was also the first



man to apply electric power to the printing-press,



in 1840. In his traction work he had a close second



in Robert Davidson, of Aberdeen, Scotland, who in



1839 operated both a lathe and a small locomotive



with the motor he had invented. His was the credit



of first actually carrying passengers--two at a time,



over a rough plank road--while it is said that his was



the first motor to be tried on real tracks, those of



the Edinburgh-Glasgow road, making a speed of four



miles an hour.







The curse of this work and of all that succeeded it



for a score of years was the necessity of depending



upon chemical batteries for current, the machine



usually being self-contained and hauling the batteries



along with itself, as in the case of the famous



Page experiments in April, 1851, when a speed of



nineteen miles an hour was attained on the line of



the Washington & Baltimore road. To this unfruitful



period belonged, however, the crude idea of taking



the current from a stationary source of power by



means of an overhead contact, which has found its



practical evolution in the modern ubiquitous trolley;



although the patent for this, based on his caveat of



1879, was granted several years later than that to



Stephen D. Field, for the combination of an electric



motor operated by means of a current from a stationary



dynamo or source of electricity conducted



through the rails. As a matter of fact, in 1856 and



again in 1875, George F. Green, a jobbing machinist,



of Kalamazoo, Michigan, built small cars and tracks



to which current was fed from a distant battery,



enough energy being utilized to haul one hundred



pounds of freight or one passenger up and down a



"road" two hundred feet long. All the work prior



to the development of the dynamo as a source of



current was sporadic and spasmodic, and cannot be



said to have left any trace on the art, though it



offered many suggestions as to operative methods.







The close of the same decade of the nineteenth



century that saw the electric light brought to perfection,



saw also the realization in practice of all the



hopes of fifty years as to electric traction. Both



utilizations depended upon the supply of current now



cheaply obtainable from the dynamo. These arts



were indeed twins, feeding at inexhaustible breasts.



In 1879, at the Berlin Exhibition, the distinguished



firm of Siemens, to whose ingenuity and enterprise



electrical development owes so much, installed a road



about one-third of a mile in length, over which the



locomotive hauled a train of three small cars at a



speed of about eight miles an hour, carrying some



twenty persons every trip. Current was fed from a



dynamo to the motor through a central third rail, the



two outer rails being joined together as the negative



or return circuit. Primitive but essentially successful,



this little road made a profound impression on the



minds of many inventors and engineers, and marked



the real beginning of the great new era, which has



already seen electricity applied to the operation of



main lines of trunk railways. But it is not to be supposed



that on the part of the public there was any



great amount of faith then discernible; and for some



years the pioneers had great difficulty, especially in



this country, in raising money for their early modest



experiments. Of the general conditions at this



moment Frank J. Sprague says in an article in the



Century Magazine of July, 1905, on the creation of



the new art: "Edison was p...