carried on, If I am not mistaken in the names, by the 

 brothers Hodgson; '' 4 into this Franklin soon drifted. 

 They were for the time considered very fine workmen 

 when hand tools had to be depended on. I have 

 heard one of the brothers say that within a year 

 Franklin with cold chisel and file on hand . . . work 

 far excelled them. 



When Franklin became satisfied that he had learned 

 all he could in that establishment he returned to 

 Philadelphia and went to work with my father, who 

 was at that time a member of the old firm of X. & 

 D. Sellers, at making machines for cutting and bend- 

 ing wire into card teeth. While working at that 

 my elder brother worked with them, and I got 

 many good lessons in the handling and use of tools. 

 He was a skilled workman as a turner on the foot 

 lathe with hand tools. I have rarely seen his equal, 

 never his superior. In that shop to show his skill 

 he turned one of those wonderful ivory balls — three 

 skeleton balls one within the other — in imitation of 

 those brought from China. As to filing flat surfaces, 

 to show and explain how a file should be shoved 

 to avoid rocking I have seen him file a piece of metal 

 over two inches broad, so that when a straightedge 

 was laid on it bore on the extreme outer edges, and 

 light could be seen under the center; in others words, 

 filing to the curvature of the file he was using. 



At a later period when he was manager of the 

 Philadelphia Museum he delivered such chemical 

 and other lectures as could be made interesting to 

 the general public by brilliant experiments. He also 

 exhibited many ingenious automata of his own in- 

 vention and construction. About the same time he 

 delivered at the Franklin Institute a course of lectures 

 on machinery, illustrated by models and movable 

 card drawings. 90 



About the time the accounts came from England 

 of the locomotive experiments on the Liverpool and 

 Manchester R. R. that excited great interest in all 

 civilized countries, Mr. Peale, to profit by the excite- 

 ment and general interest, designed a model locomo- 

 tive, based mainly on the description of the Ericsson 

 engine in the Rain Hill tests. 96 This working model 



94 Sellers was not mistaken in the name. However, the map 

 of the Brandywine Millseat Company Survey, 1822 (MS in 

 Hagley Museum) indicates that the Hodgson brothers' shops 

 were located a mile or more from Young's mills. 



95 He was employed in the Museum from 1822 to 1833; 

 and he lectured at Franklin Institute from 1831 until he departed 

 for Europe in 1833 (Charles Coleman Sellers, cited in note 

 20 above, vol. 2, pp. 345, 382). 



was built by Matthias W. Baldwin, and for a time was 

 a great attraction, making the circuit of the museum 

 rooms, that at that time were in the Arcade Building, 

 drawing two miniature cars, each seating four persons. 

 At the time this model was built Mr. Baldwin was 

 carrying on the business of making bookbinders' 

 tools and copper cylinders for calico printing. No 

 doubt this little locomotive may safely be considered 

 as the nucleus of the great Baldwin Locomotive 

 Works of the present day. 



Prof. Robert M. Patterson succeeded Dr. Samuel 

 Moore as director of the U.S. Mint. He was a warm 

 friend of Mr. Franklin Peale, and had great confidence 

 in his philosophical and mechanical ability, and it was 

 during his administration that most of the great 

 improvements resulting from Mr. Peak's mission to 

 Europe were introduced and carried to perfection in 

 the mint. No one could have been better qualified 

 for the directorship of the mint than R. M. Patterson, 

 who it might almost be said was born in or to it — 

 the son of Dr. Robert Patterson, who in the early- 

 history of the mint was for so long a period its head. 

 Adam Eckfeldt as chief coiner had grown old in the 

 service. This was before the time of nefarious political 

 doctrine, that "to the victors belong the spoils," had 

 reached the officers of the mint, to whom of all others 

 practical knowledge and experience is so essential; 

 "it is practice that makes perfect." 



Mr. Eckfeldt was a man of staunch integrity, a 

 cautious, careful, orderly and painstaking man; he 

 was not one of the dashing, pushing, inventive me- 

 chanics, though under his care many apparently slight 

 improvements were gradually adopted that in the 

 aggregate amounted to a great deal in the economy 

 of working. He was by no means deficient in inven- 

 tive ability. I have more than once heard that leader 

 in fire engine building in Philadelphia, Patrick Lyon, 

 give Mr. Eckfeldt the entire credit for the long-end 

 levers with folding handles, that superseded the side- 

 levers on the old-fashioned fire engines, and by which 

 the operators applied their force easier and in a more 

 direct manner. Although Pat Lyon was the first to 



99 It will be remembered that Ericsson's Nooelty was not the 

 successful contender in the 1829 Rain Hill trials. It would 

 be interesting to know why Peale chose this design rather 

 than that of Stephenson, whose Rocket was the winner (see 

 Journal of The Franklin Institute, May 1833, vol. 15, p. 301). In 

 a lecture on the model, Franklin Peale explained its "analogy 

 to, and differences from" the Novelty. 



70 



