The following circumstances connected with the arrival of the engine
at Bordentown, N.J., are related by Isaac Dripps, Esq., for many years
master mechanic of the Camden and Am boy Railroad, and afterward
superintendent of motive power of the Pennsylvania Railroad, who is
now, after a busy life, enjoying a peaceable retirement at his
pleasant home in West Philadelphia.
Mr. Dripps, who is now in the eighty-second year of his age, was
employed by Robert and Edwin Stevens in repairing and assisting with
their steamboats on the Delaware River and at Hoboken as early as
1829. When the "John Bull" arrived in Philadelphia he was detailed by
Robert Stevens to attend to the transportation of the engine to
Bordentown, where it was landed safely the last week in August, 1831.
The boiler and cylinders were in place, but the loose parts--rods,
pistons, valves, etc.--were packed in boxes. No drawings or directions
for putting the engine together had come to hand, and young Dripps,
who had never seen a locomotive, found great difficulty in discovering
how to put the parts in place, alone and unassisted, as Robert
Stevens, who had returned from Europe, was absent at Hoboken at the
time attending to other matters.