Milestones in the Mighty Age of Steam - The Grasshopper and the Corliss

After the discovery of the power of steam, man toyed with the idea of a steam engine that could move itself. The implications of such an invention were far reaching. The first steps were taken in England in the early part of the nineteenth century and a locomotive which successfully hauled a train of vehicles was built there in 1825. The first American locomotive was the Tom Thumb built by Peter Cooper.

In a competition sponsored by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, Phineas Davis, a watchmaker of York, Pennsylvania, built a locomotive which was referred to as the “grasshopper” type because of its appearance and the up-and-down motion of its driving rods. This was really the first successful steam railroad engine in this country.