The education of the masses multiplied the number thinkers. As a consequence, mechanical skill and invention is the peculiar growth of the present century and the United States in this regard ranks among the foremost nations of the world.
From the creation of the world down to the middle of the last century, nearly all the work of the world had been done by the muscular labor of men or animals.
But in England and America men were discovering that machinery might be made to do work of human hands. It was not until 1764, that James Watt commenced his wonderful inventions, and ten years more elapsed before his engine was of any practical use.
Meanwhile Hargreaves, Arkwright and Crompton had invented machines for the manufacture of cloth. In America there were lands well adapted for raising cotton, but owing to the difficulty of extricating the seeds from the cotton, but little was used and that little was very expensive. In 1784, only eight bagfuls of cotton were exported from Savannah to England but when Eli Whitney invented the cotton-gin in 1792, a great change took place. It was seen immediately that the machine would do the work of hundreds of men and a new industry and new product was given to the world. Inconsiderable as these inventions may seem, they changed the clothing material of the English-speaking people throughout the world. In a few years their costume so changed that they might be looked upon as belonging to a different race and a different civilization.
On August 27th, 1787, while the National convention was at work at Philadelphia framing the constitution they were invited to behold a sight that the world had never seen. It was John Fitch gliding up stream in the first practical steamboat ever constructed. In July, 1788, the boat made its first trip from Philadelphia up the river to Burlington—amid the cheering of crowds and the salvos of artillery. It continued to make trips during part of two years but never exceeded three miles an hour. As the machinery was imperfect and the running expensive, it was at length abandoned.
Genius is far-sighted and prophetic. John Fitch looking into the future saw that the time would come when steamships would traverse the ocean, and glide to and fro upon the great rivers of the West. He went to Ohio to spend his last days, and when the shadow of death was upon him, he made this request, "Bury me on the banks of the Ohio that I may be where the song of the boatmen and the music of the engines shall enliven the stillness of my resting place." Twenty years passed away before Fitch's idea was realized. At length Robert Fulton built the Clermont in 1807 and started up the Hudson river. The country people knew not what to make of it. A Dutchman shouted to his wife, "The devil is on his way up the river with a sawmill in a boat." Fulton had succeeded where others had failed. It was the beginning of a new era in navigation. In 1819, the Savannah was the first steamboat to cross the Atlantic ocean. John Stevens of Hoboken, New Jersey appeared in 1812 before Congress with a plan for a railroad.
An Ocean Steamer.
Two years later, July 25th, 1814, George Stevenson of England completed and ran the Rocket, the first practical locomotive in the world.