

\ r, i< I', s -■> - I' ti I 



CINCINNATI. 



Figure 50. — Business Card of Niles & Co., about 1855. 



machines with which they were most famihar, resorting to western- 

 bailt machines only if in immediate need of additional power. 

 Just as naturally, the eastern banker preferred to see orders for loco- 

 motives stay in New England, because he either had an interest in 

 one of the locomotive works or simply desired to promote the local 

 economy. The Railroad Record summarized the problem: 



the majority of engineers and superintendents upon our western roads, 

 are Eastern men, and come amongst us with Eastern prejudices, being 

 unable to comprehend how machinery can be manufactured in a country 

 where, but a short time since, the Indian roamed untrammelled in his 

 native forests. "^^ 



Some months later, the same journal commented more heatedly: 



Objection has been made to our Western locomotives — mostly by 

 "Eastern men". . . that they have not th^ finish of the Eastern shop 

 work. This may have been the case heretofore, as it has been the aim of 

 our mechanics to put the greater portion of the price of their work into 

 rather than upon their locomotives, that while the Eastern gingerbread 

 work is half the time in the repair shops theirs may be doing its duty 

 upon the road.'"'* 



^63 (May 4, 1854), vol. 2, p. 148. 



1^* Ibid. (October 19, 1854), vol. 2, p. 565. 



Ill 



