"Such is the first great attempt to establish the use of railways," writes a delighted editor, "for the general purposes of travelling; and such is its success that the traffic is already great; and, considering that there was formerly no coach at all on either of the roads along which the railroad runs, quite wonderful. A trade and intercourse have arisen out of nothing, and nobody knows how."
Such was their small and imperfect beginning, we should say, now that railroads, improved and perfected, have fulfilled Stephenson's prediction, and have become the great highways of the civilized world.
These wonders stirred the enterprise of old Massachusetts. Bunker-hill monument was then being built, and built of Quincy granite. To make an easier and cheaper transit to the water, the company built a railway from the quarries to the wharf, a distance of three miles, whence the blocks were carried in boats across the harbour to Charlestown. The rails were made of oak and pine, and the cars ran by horses. This was the first railroad in the United States.
The example of the monument building committee, and the success of the Stockton road, put the Boston people on a new track to get into the country. By the old modes of travel, the Connecticut river valley was very far off. Intercourse with the interior towns cost time and money. Going to Boston was a long and expensive journey. Of course there were not many journeys made, and no more trading than was absolutely necessary. Cheap and easy travelling was the need: Boston wanted what the country produced, and the country wanted what Boston merchants had to sell.
A canal was talked of, and routes surveyed. But nobody was sure it was the best thing, when English newspapers broached railroads. Ah, there it was; the best thing! Two advantages it had over a canal. A canal must only be a skating-ground for boys some months in the year, while a railway could be run winter and summer. It was also quicker and pleasanter for passengers. So, as early as 1827, the subject was stirring the minds of business men, and brought before the notice of the legislature. It was a horse-railway they were thinking of, and nothing more. It, however, came to nothing.
The first passenger railway in America, the Baltimore and Ohio, was opened for fifteen miles, in 1830, with horse-power; and the Mohawk and Hudson, from Albany to Schenectady, sixteen miles, was run with horses in 1831. A few months later the steam-horse, with its iron sinews, drove them off, never to yield the right of way again.
