AN HISTORICAL NOTE ON EARLY AMERICAN 
RAILWAYS. 
CHARLES H. CHANDLER, A. M., 
Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy , Ripon College. 
The incidents here presented, related by one who had a little 
part in the early work on one of the first railroads, and supple¬ 
mented by items gathered from the newspapers of nearly seventy 
years ago, may suggest that certain questions of to-day, such 
as the proper length of franchises and the relations of the state to 
public conveyance, are merely old questions in somewhat changed 
forms; and may also suggest difficulties presented to the earlier 
efforts which are so foreign to our present conditions that they 
could hardly have a place in our thought. 
As is well known, American railroads had their origin not 
far from the year 1830. Fifteen miles of the Baltimore and 
Ohio were open to passengers in that year. Perhaps some of 
us recall a picture, in a book on United States history studied 
by our parents or by ourselves, of one of their cars somewhat 
resembling a summer street car of a dozen or more years ago, 
and, like that, drawn by horses, but with accommodations for an 
additional load of passengers upon its top. The question of 
priority in the use of locomotives is subject to conflicting claims, 
but it is at least certain that the Mohawk and Hudson, the 
Baltimore and Ohio, and the South Carolina railroads had taken 
this step in 1832. Notices of New England roads are less fre¬ 
quent, but certainly that section of the country, largely occupied 
with mechanical labor, was not greatly behind. The Boston 
and Quincy road was opened in 1827, but not for passengers. 
The burden borne by this road was principally Quincy granite, 
and the motive power was that of horses. But plans for loco¬ 
motive railways were “ in the air, ” and very many lines were 
