Figure 80. — Seth Boyden (1788- 1870) 

 From J. Leander Bishop, A History of Ameri- 

 can Manufactures from 1608 to i860, 3d ed., 

 3 vols. (Philadelphia, 1868). 



to me, and showed the memoranda of the immense 

 number of experiments he had made before he had 

 succeeded. 



This leather-splitting machine I never saw, but his 

 letters to my father at the time explained his substi- 

 tuting a moving table for the cylinder, various experi- 

 ments as to the mode of holding the leather firmly to 

 it, and to the edge of a quickly vibrating splitting knife. 



Mr. Boyden is well known as the father of malleable 

 iron castings, of which he made an entire success, and 

 afterwards his great invention of manufacturing felt 

 hat bodies by machinery, over which patent there was 

 a long and bitter contest against a powerful combina- 

 tion. He resorted to the novel expedient of exhibiting 

 his machine at work in the presence of judge and jury, 

 and finally sustained his rights. 



I have made this digression to show the versatility 

 of Mr. Boyden as an inventor. I have heard him say 

 the hardest work of an inventor, was to discover what 

 was wanted: that once established all was easy, or, 

 as he expressed it, "plain sailing." 



To return to the locomotive "Essex," and its mates. 

 Previous to his entering into the contract to build 

 the two engines above referred to he came to Phila- 



delphia, bringing with him a movable card model 

 of his proposed valve gear, in which he took the 

 motion from the crosshead. He laid great stress on 

 the importance of quick opening and closing of steam 

 ports, so adjustable as to take the greatest advantage 

 of using the steam expansively. I do not recollect 

 the details of his arrangement. It was in a measure 

 anticipating the present link motion. This model 

 was so made that by moving the piston the position 

 of the valve was shown. Baldwin at that time was 

 confined to engine cylinders of from 10% to 12 inches 

 diameter and 16-inch stroke. My brother and myself 

 were using 10-inch cylinders by 18-inch stroke. 

 Boyden proposed using 8-inch diameter cylinder by 

 30-inch stroke with his adjustable cut-off, and he 

 insisted on it that we were all wrong in the short 

 stroke. He had made drawings to use Baldwin's 

 half-crank to get width of fire-box. He had been 

 to Messrs. Vail & Son, Morristown, N.J., to inquire 

 about tires, and some heavy iron work, and had 

 learned from them that the half crank was patented, 

 and at the same time that we had outside attachment 

 engines successfully running on the Pennsylvania 

 State road; this brought him to Philadelphia. 



He stated to me that before calling on us he had 

 seen Mr. Baldwin, had tried to interest him in long- 

 stroke engines, with his valve arrangement, and that 

 Mr. Baldwin had declined to sell the right to use 

 his half-cranks on the engines he [Boyden] had agreed 

 to build for the Morris and Essex Railroad. He 

 had many questions to ask about steadiness of the 

 outside connected engines on the road. We at that 

 time had two on the State road, one of which had 

 been in daily service over a year. One of his questions 

 was as to patents covering any portion of our engines, 

 saying he would rather abandon building, and demon- 

 strating the value of his hobb\ — expansive steam in 

 long-stroke cylinders. I took him to our shops, showed 

 him two engines then on the floor, 247 that but little 

 was being done on, as we were driven to our full 

 capacity on the contracts we had taken to build 

 the steam engines, rolling mills, milling machines, 

 ingot moulds, and melting and refining furnaces for 

 the branch mints at Charlotte, N.C., and Dahlonega, 

 Ga.; also remodeling the melting and refining de- 

 partments of the mints at Philadelphia and New 

 Orleans. 



247 The author seems to refer to two locomotives, in addition 

 to the two already completed. No further information on 

 these later locomotives has been found. 



188 



