THOMAS BLANCHARD
Blanchard endeavored to secure support to build a railroad in Massachusetts, and the joint committee on roads and canals of the Massachusetts Legislature, in January, 1826, endorsed the model of his railway and steam carriage, and recommended them “to all the friends of internal improvements.” Notwithstanding this report, capitalists viewed the project as visionary, and Blanchard met with no greater success when he subsequently applied to the Legislature of New York. Giving up his plans he thenceforward devoted his attention to the subject of steam navigation.
Blanchard was a prolific inventor, having taken out no less than thirty or forty patents for as many different inventions. He did not reap great benefit from his labors, for many of his inventions scarcely paid the cost of getting them up, while others were appropriated without payment to him, or even giving him credit. His machine for turning irregular forms was his most notable work, and even of that, others sought to defraud him. To defend himself he was forced to go to the courts and even to Congress, before he succeeded in establishing his rights. After the success of this machine he made other improvements in the manufacture of arms, constructing thirteen different machines that were operated in the government armories.
Johnson
Two brothers Johnson had a small engineering establishment in Philadelphia, in 1828. They put upon the streets in that year a vehicle that J. G. Pangborn, in his The World’s Rail Way, says was “the first steam wagon built, and actually operated as such, in the United States.” The same writer, describing this wagon, says that it had a single cylinder set horizontally, with a connecting-rod attachment with a single crank at the middle of the driving-axle. Its two driving-wheels were eight feet in diameter and made of wood, the same as those on an ordinary road wagon. The two forward or guiding wheels were much smaller than the others, and were arranged in the usual manner of a common wagon. It had an upright boiler hung up behind, shaped like a huge bottle, the smoke-stack coming out through the center of the top. The safety-valve was held down by a weight and lever, and the horses in the neighborhood did not take at all kindly to the puffing of the machine as it jolted over the rough streets. Generally it ran well, and could take without difficulty reasonable grades in the streets and roadways. During its existence, however, it knocked down a number of awning-posts, ran into and broke several window fronts, and sometimes was altogether unmanageable. Like all others of their day, however, the Johnsons were ahead of their time. There was no demand for their steam wagon, road conditions made it unavailable and the machine itself was, despite much merit, really not much more than a suggestion of better things three-quarters of a century later.
Walter Hancock
Born in Marlborough, Wiltshire, England, June 16, 1799. Died May 14, 1852.
The father of Walter Hancock was James Hancock, a timber merchant and cabinet maker. Walter received a common school education, and then was apprenticed to a watchmaker and jeweler in London. The bent of his inclination, however, was toward engineering, and he turned his attention to experimenting along the lines that were at that time absorbing the thoughts and efforts of those men of England interested in mechanical and scientific subjects.