"Tom Thumb," constructed in 1829, at Baltimore, and sent over the Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road to Ellicott's Mills in one hour and twelve minutes, August 28, 1830, settled the momentous question.[1] In spite of its laughable features the picture representing the "Exciting Trial of Speed between Mr. Peter Cooper's Locomotive 'Tom Thumb,' and one of Stockton & Stokes's Horse-Cars,"[2] in which the little model locomotive has caught up with and is passing the horse-car, represents nothing less than the dawning of a new epoch in human history. Though improvements were not made with great rapidity, they came as fast as the rail road was able to profit by them. The Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road merited the honorable title that has been given it—the Railway University of America. While its rival, the Canal Company, had a struggle to secure funds to do its work, the railway carried the same burden and with it the heavier burden of doubt as to the future and many physical and mechanical perplexities forever holding
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THE GREAT AMERICAN CANALS
