Ohio did not feel the suspension of this great monopoly with its thirty-five millions so severely. Millions of money had just been distributed over the state for labor in the construction of internal improvements, and with canals, coaches, and steamboats, and agriculture in a nourishing condition, the prosperity that seemed lost in the ruins of speculation and bankruptcy, proved a small impediment in line of progress or march of empire.
The people did not become idle or discouraged; farming interests were increasing all the time, and more attention was directed to schools and education than ever before; and civilization was manifestly and permanently on the advance. Still the conditions of trade suffered serious embarrassments connected with the unstable condition of the currency or money of the country. Bank-notes of one state were at a heavy discount in every other. This, with bank and individual failures, caused much inconvenience for a time, but things soon grew better. Population and aggregate wealth of the state increased, and in 1847 gave the greatest yield of produce ever previously harvested, and which, owing to the “Irish famine,” was disposed of at speculation prices, and the state went on to prosperity and comparative excellence and influence.
The mass of descendants of pioneers in Ohio looked forward to agriculture as the source of subsistence and independent competency. “Millionaire,” in early days, was a word seldom used, and entirely unknown in biography. The pioneer saw the necessity for the promotion and advancement of true civilization, that every citizen should own a home—a place he might call his own—a place to live and labor for the good of himself and others. And not until the introduction of the railroad president, private palace cars, trusts, combines, and transformation of the public service into party machines for becoming suddenly rich, did the more observing recognize the true estimate and sound brotherhood existing with the gold bags of the nation. Nor did the poor suspect that combined wealth would ever dream as did the thirsting Turk at midnight hour—“that Liberty, her knee in suppliance bent, should tremble at its power.”
CHAPTER VI.
OHIO—HER RAILROAD AND TELEGRAPH ERA.
The canal era proved so satisfactory that people took their steps more rapidly than ever before, and began measuring the hours by dollars and cents, and the value of life by the amount of labor performed. The feeling that something should be done to increase time and diminish space became universal, and not a few prospectors had their eyes open for the “old stone” that turned all it touched to gold.
The application of steam as the coming motor power for transportation and travel was pictured in the minds of many inventors in this country and in Europe; and trials of engines and their working abilities became the all-absorbing subject of the times, and as early as 1835 it could be seen that provincialism was passing away and that the citizens of Ohio felt that coaches, wagons and canal-boats were too slow and insufficient for advanced civilization.
The opening of a road between Manchester and Liverpool, September 15, 1830, and one in South Carolina the following January, gave the subject increased interest, although the efforts were exceedingly crude, and often bordering on the ridiculous. It was, however, a problem that had to be worked out, and every one having a mind for construction became a model maker of locomotives and railroad tracks. Even Peter Cooper built an engine and named it “Tom Thumb,” and in his attempt to test its superiority over horse-power was beaten owing to that “if” which always catches the rear contestant. It appears that in 1830 the Baltimore & Ohio road had a double track finished from Baltimore to Ellicott’s Mills, a distance of fifteen miles, and was utilized by means of horse-power. Mr. Cooper, who had built a small locomotive after his own mind to demonstrate to his own satisfaction the possibilities of steam as a motor power on roads, after making a number of successful trips to the mills and return, a race was proposed between “Tom Thumb” and its light open car, and a car and one horse of those run by the company occupying the road. The race was to start at the Relay House and end in Baltimore, a distance of nine miles.
On the 28th day of August, 1830, just seventeen days before the Manchester and Liverpool Exhibition, the start was made, and, as reported at the time: