CATALOG OF THE MECHANICAL COLLECTIONS 39 



MACHINERY OF THE "CLERMONT" AND THE "CHANCELLOR 



LIVINGSTON" 



U.S.N.M. no. 180137 ; drawings ; deposited by the Stevens Institute of Tech- 

 nology; not illustrated. 



The information given to the Museum with the drawings is as 

 follows : 



"These drawings of the machinery of the first steamboats of Robert 

 Fulton, the Clermont^ and the Chancellor Livingston were made by 

 Robert Fulton and used by Mr. Allaire, the engine builder, who sub- 

 sequently presented them to Charles H. Haswell, Esq. 



"The first named was afterward lost at the West Point Foundry and 

 when afterward found was given by the discoverer to Chief Engineer 

 Wm. H. Shock, U. S. Navy, by whom it was, eighteen years later, 

 in 1871, presented to the Stevens Institute of Technology. 



"The second drawing remained in the possession of Mr. Haswell 

 until, in 1872, it was presented to the Institute by its owner, who sur- 

 rendered all proprietary claim to the other sketch." 



THE CLERMONT DRAWINGS 



The drawing of the Clermont (really the North River ^ the re- 

 modeled Clermont) machinery is a nicely executed wash drawing, 

 14 by 22 inches in size, of a longitudinal section in elevation through 

 the "engine room" part of the vessel, including a portion from a point 

 slightly aft of the boiler grates forward to include the entire machin- 

 ery and its framework. The floor timbers and deck beams are shown. 

 An inscription, evidently added after the drawing was found at the 

 West Point Foundry, reads: "Engine of Steamboat Clermont-North 

 River. The Original Drawing Drawn by Robert Fulton, Esqr. New 

 York 1808. From the archives of the West Point Foundry Associa- 

 tion." 



The drawing unfortunately is stained and worn to the extent that 

 many details are obliterated. On the other hand, it is believed to 

 be a duplicate of one of several original drawings by Fulton now 

 in the possession of the New Jersey Historical Society, and from a 

 study of both drawings together with a description of the boat 

 deposited in the New York Historical Society by Richard Varick De 

 Witt in 1858 (published in Robert Fulton and the Clermont^ by A. C. 

 Sutcliff, 1908) the following description of the engine can be given 

 with some degree of accuracy : 



The engine was constructed at Birmingham, England, by Boulton 

 and Watt and shipped to New York in 1806. It was double acting, 

 with a cylinder 2 feet in diameter and a 4-foot stroke. The cylinder 

 stood upon a condenser shell of the same diameter and about 2 feet 

 in height. The piston rod extended upward and terminated in a 

 cross head, which traveled in guides on vertical timbers of a gallows 



