FIG. 107.—STEVENS’ TWIN SCREW PROPELLER AND ENGINE, 1804.
In 1804 Col. John Stevens constructed a boat on the Hudson, driven by a Watt engine, and having a tubular boiler of his own invention and a twin screw propeller. The engine, boiler, and twin screws are shown in [Fig. 107]. The same year Oliver Evans used a stern paddle wheel boat on the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It was driven by a double acting high pressure engine, and geared so as to rotate wagon wheels by which it was transported on land, as well as the paddle wheels when on the water. It was in primitive form both a locomotive and a steamboat.
FIG. 108.—THE “CLERMONT,” 1807.
In 1807 Robert Fulton built the “Clermont,” and permanently established steam navigation on the Hudson River between New York and Albany. Fulton in 1802-1803, while living in Paris with Mr. Joel Barlow, and with the aid and encouragement of Chancellor Livingston, of New Jersey, had built an earlier steamboat 86 feet long, and although it broke down owing to defects in the strength of the hull, he was so encouraged that he ordered Messrs. Boulton & Watt, of England, to send to America a new steam engine, and upon his return to America he built the “Clermont.” This vessel, although not the first steamboat, was nevertheless the first to make a voyage of any considerable length, and to run regularly and continuously for practical purposes, and Fulton was the first inventor in this field whose labors were not to be classed as an abandoned experiment. The “Clermont” as originally built was quite a different looking boat from that usually given in the histories. A model of the original construction is to be found in the National Museum at Washington. In the winter of 1807-8 she was remodeled as shown in [Fig. 108]. She then appeared as a side wheel steamer, whose wheels were provided with outer guards and enclosed in side wheel houses, and whose shaft had outer bearings in the guards, which were not in the original boat. The hull was 133 feet long, 18 feet beam, and 7 feet depth. The “Clermont’s” engines were coupled to the crank shaft by a bell crank, and the paddle wheel shaft was separated from the crank shaft, but connected with it by gearing. The cylinders were 24 inches in diameter, and 4 foot stroke. The paddle wheels had buckets 4 feet long with a dip of 2 feet. She made the first trip from New York to Albany of 150 miles in 32 hours, and returned in 30 hours, which was the first voyage of any considerable length ever made by steam power.
The honor of inventing the steamboat has been claimed for many inventors, and that many worthy experimenters had been working in this field, and that Fulton had the benefit of their experience is true. The fact is, however, that the evolution of any great, invention is a slow and cumulative process, the product of many minds, and while the proposers, suggesters, and experimenters are entitled to their share of the credit, it is the man who achieves success and gives to the public the benefit of his labors whom the world honors, and in this connection the name of Fulton stands pre-eminent, for although the “Clermont” was 264 years later than the steamboat of Blasco de Garay, the “Clermont” marks the beginning of practical steam navigation, and whatever the claims of other inventors may be, it is certain that steam navigation, established by Fulton in 1807, on the Hudson, preceded the practical use of the steamboat in any other country by at least five years, for it was not until 1812 that Henry Bell, of Scotland, built the “Comet,” that plied between Glasgow and Greenock, on the Clyde, and not until 1814 was a steam packet used for hire on the Thames in England.
At the same time that Fulton was in Paris making his first experiments with the steamboat, Col. John Stevens, the most celebrated boat builder and engineer of his day, was actively experimenting in America in the same line. Having in 1804 made the first application of steam to the screw propeller, he in 1807 built the “Phœnix,” which was driven by paddle wheels. The “Phœnix” was constructed shortly after Fulton’s boat, but was barred from use on the Hudson by the exclusive monopoly obtained by Fulton and Livingston from the State Legislature, and she was accordingly taken from New York to Philadelphia by sea, which was the first ocean voyage by a steam vessel.
The first steamboat on the Mississippi was the “Orleans,” of 100 tons, built at Pittsburg by Fulton and Livingston in 1811. She had a stern wheel, and went from Pittsburg to New Orleans in 14 days.