HAVING PROGRESSED thus far in our story, or properly having began in
the middle, it is now necessary that we should turn back to the proper
starting point.
Several years since a widow woman resided in the outskirts of St.
Louis, whose name was Brainerd. Her husband had been a mechanic, noted
for his ingenuity, but was killed some five years before by the
explosion of a steam boiler. He left behind him a son, hump-backed,
dwarfed, but with an amiable disposition that made him a favorite with
all with whom he came in contact.
If nature afflicts in one direction she frequently makes amends in
another direction, and this dwarf, small and misshapen as he was, was
gifted with a most wonderful mind. His mechanical ingenuity bordered
on the marvelous. When he went to school, he was a general favorite
with teachers and pupils. The former loved him for his sweetness of
disposition, and his remarkable proficiency in all studies, while the
latter based their affection chiefly upon the fact that he never
refused to assist any of them at their tasks, while with the
pocket-knife which he carried he constructed toys which were their
delight. Some of these were so curious and amusing that, had they
been securer by letters patent, they would have brought a competency
to him and his widowed mother.
But Johnny never thought of patenting them, although the principal
support of himself and mother came from one or two patents, which his
father had secured upon inventions, not near the equal of his.
There seemed no limit to his inventive powers. He made a locomotive
and then a steamboat, perfect in every part, even to the minutest,
using nothing but his knife, hammer, and a small chisel. He
constructed a clock with his jack-knife, which kept perfect time, and
the articles which he made were wonderfully stared at at fairs, and in
show windows, while Johnny modestly pegged away at some new idea. He
became a master of the art of telegraphy without assistance from any
one using merely a common school philosophy with which to acquire the
alphabet. He then made a couple of batteries, ran a line from his
window to a neighbor's, insulating it by means of the necks of some
bottles, taught the other boy the alphabet, and thus they amused
themselves sending messages back and forth.
Thus matters progressed until he was fifteen years of age, when he
came home one day, and lay down on the settee by his mother, and gave
a great sigh.
'What is the matter?' she inquired. 'I want to make something.'
'Why, then, don't you make it?'
'Because I don't know what it shall be; I've fixed up everything I can
think of.'
'And you are like Alexander, sighing for more worlds to conquer. Is
that it?'
'Not exactly, for there is plenty for one to do, if I could only find
out what it is.'
'Have you ever made a balloon?' The boy laughed.
'You were asking for the cat the other day, and wondering what had
become of her. I didn't tell you that the last I saw of her was
through the telescope, she being about two miles up in the clouds, and
going about fifty miles an hour.'
'I thought you looked as though you knew something about her,' replied
the mother, trying to speak reprovingly, and yet smiling in spite of
herself.
'Can't you tell me something to make?' finally asked the boy.
'Yes; there is something I have often thought of, and wonder why it
was not made long ago; but you are not smart enough to do it, Johnny.'
'Maybe not; but tell me what it is.'
'It is a man that shall go by steam!' The boy lay still several
minutes without speaking a word and then sprung up. 'By George! I'll
do it!' And he started out of the room, and was not seen again until
night. His mother felt no anxiety. She was pleased; for, when her boy
was at work, he was happy, and she knew that he had enough now, to
keep him engaged for months to come.
So it proved. He spent several weeks in thought, before he made the
first effort toward constructing his greatest success of all. He then
enlarged his workshop, and so arranged it, that he would not be in
danger of being seen by any curious eyes. He wanted no disturbance
while engaged upon this scheme.
From a neighboring foundry, whose proprietor took great interest in
the boy, he secured all that he needed. He was allowed full liberty to
make what castings he chose, and to construct whatever he wished. And
so he began his work.
The great point was to obtain the peculiar motion of a man walking.
This secured, the man himself could be easily made, and dressed up in
any style required. Finally the boy believed that he had hit upon the
true scheme.
So he plied harder than ever, scarcely pausing to take his meals.
Finally he got the machine together, fired up, and with feelings
somewhat akin to those, of Sir Isaac Newton, when demonstrating the
truth or falsity of some of his greatest discoveries, he watched the
result.
Soon the legs begin moving up and down, but never a step did they
advance! The power was there, sufficient to run a saw-mill, every
thing seemed to work, but the thing wouldn't go!
The boy was not ready to despair. He seated himself on the bench
beside the machine, and keeping up a moderate supply of steam,
throwing in bits of wood, and letting in water, when necessary, he
carefully watched the movement for several hours.
Occasionally, Johnny walked slowly back and forth, and with his eyes
upon the 'stately stepping,' endeavored to discover the precise nature
of that which was lacking in his machine.
At length it came to him. He saw from the first that it was not merely
required that the steam man should lift up its feet and put them down
again, but there must be a powerful forward impulse at the same
moment. This was the single remaining difficulty to be overcome. It
required two weeks before Johnny Brainerd succeeded. But it all came
clear and unmistakable at last, and in this simple manner:
(Ah! but we cannot be so unjust to the plodding genius as to divulge
his secret. Our readers must be content to await the time when the
young man sees fit to reveal it himself.)
When the rough figure was fairly in working order, the inventor
removed everything from around it, so that it stood alone in the
center of his shop. Then he carefully let on steam.
Before he could shut it off, the steam man walked clean through the
side of his shop, and fetched up against the corner of the house, with
a violence that shook it to its foundation. In considerable
trepidation, the youngster dashed forward, shut off steam, and turned
it round. As it was too cumbersome for him to manage in any other way,
he very cautiously let on steam again, and persuaded it to walk back
into the shop, passing through the same orifice through which it had
emerged, and came very nigh going out on the opposite side again.
The great thing was now accomplished, and the boy devoted himself to
bringing it as near perfection as possible. The principal thing to be
feared was its getting out of order, since the slightest
disarrangement would be sufficient to stop the progress of the man.
Johnny therefore made it of gigantic size, the body and limbs being no
more than 'Shells,' used as a sort of screen to conceal the working of
the engine. This was carefully painted in the manner mentioned in
another place, and the machinery was made as strong and durable as it
was possible for it to be. It was so constructed as to withstand the
severe jolting to which it necessarily would be subjected, and finally
was brought as nearly perfect as it was possible to bring a thing not
possessing human intelligence.
By suspending the machine so that Its feet were clear of the floor,
Johnny Brainerd ascertained that under favorable circumstances It
could run very nearly sixty miles an hour. It could easily do that,
and draw a car connected to it on the railroad, while on a common road
it could make thirty miles, the highest rate at which he believed it
possible for a wagon to be drawn upon land with any degree of safety.
It was the boy's intention to run at twenty miles an hour, while where
everything was safe, he would demonstrate the power of the invention
by occasionally making nearly double that.
As it was, he rightly calculated that when it came forth, it would
make a great sensation throughout the entire United States.