Robert Fulton, the inventor of steamboats, was born on a farm in
Pennsylvania. His parents were Irish Protestants--a strong, laborious
race. Robert was a delicate, handsome boy, with a fine forehead and
brilliant eyes. Almost as a child he became a mechanic, inventing
machines and lingering around workshops. He was thought dull at school,
and made slow progress in the usual studies. But he was always
inventing.
One day, when Robert was about nine years old, he came late to school,
and when his teacher reproved him, produced a new lead-pencil which he
had been making while playing truant. The boys were all anxious to have
one of Fulton's pencils--they were better than any they had seen. In his
school days he made rockets to celebrate the Fourth of July, and in
1778, in the midst of the war, set them off in his native town. About
this time he made an air-gun and a boat moved by wheels. He had a strong
taste for drawing. His mother, who was now a widow and poor, wanted his
help.
Fulton was only seventeen, but he went up to Philadelphia, made money,
became acquainted with Dr. Franklin, and when he was twenty-one came
back to his mother with his earnings, and bought her a farm. Here she
lived happily for some years, watching and enjoying the rising
prosperity of her son. The deed by which Fulton at twenty-one gave the
farm to his mother is still preserved.
There are persons living who might have seen the first steamboat that
sailed on the Hudson. Many remember when the famous _De Witt Clinton_
and _North America_ were thought the wonders of navigation; when they
sailed over the tranquil river at the rate of sixteen miles an hour, and
left behind them thick clouds of black smoke that hung over the
landscape for miles. The _North America_ was long the pride of the river
navigation, the swiftest vessel in the world. The Hudson has always been
the favorite scene of steam navigation and enterprise. It is the
birth-place of the steamboat.
Here, in 1807, Robert Fulton, on board of the _Clermont_, his first
vessel, sailed in a day and a half from New York to Albany. He stopped
for a few hours at Clermont, and then in four more finished his voyage.
It was the signal for an entire change in the whole art of navigation.
From that time the steamboat has been slowly advancing, its size has
increased to immense proportions, its engines have become animated
giants, and Fulton's little vessel of one hundred and sixty tons is
converted into the _Furnessia_, the _Alaska_, and the _Great Eastern_.
Fulton, a fair, delicate, thoughtful young man, had gone to England, to
France, had become acquainted with many eminent inventors, and had
already planned a steamboat. He was the first to make one successful. He
came back to New York, and, aided by his friend Livingston, in 1806
began to build his boat. It was only a small vessel, rudely built; in it
he placed an engine made by James Watt, the English inventor; the
paddle-wheels he planned himself, and the imperfect machinery. It seems
now a very easy thing to build a steamboat, but it was then thought
impossible. Men called the boat Fulton's Folly. Hardly any one supposed
that a new era in navigation was about to begin, and that Fulton's
machine would at last cover the world with its discoveries. At last the
boat was finished.
The fires were lighted, the boilers hissed, the crank turned, the wheels
began to move, and the _Clermont_ made its way, at about five miles an
hour, from Charles Brown's dock-yard on the East River to Jersey City.
Once she stopped, and men cried, "There, it has failed!" But it was only
because Fulton was anxious to alter some part of his machine. The great
voyage was successful. The steamer reached Jersey City, and Fulton's
victory was won.
Soon the Hudson began to abound with Fulton's steamboats, the wonders of
the world. There was the famous _Paragon_, a vessel of the enormous size
of three hundred tons. One built for the Czar was called the _Emperor of
Russia_. A ferry-boat ran from New York to Jersey City. In the midst of
the war with England Fulton built the first war steamer. It was two
thousand tons burden, a fine shot-proof vessel, and sailed at the rate
of three miles an hour as far as Sandy Hook. Its size seemed immense,
its power irresistible, and it was told with alarm in London that Fulton
and New York had produced the most dangerous of warlike machines.
America now abounded in steamboats, but they were only slowly adopted in
Europe. London, Carlyle relates, was long without them.
The fair, pale, delicate inventor did not live long to enjoy his
success. His lungs were always weak. He was always at work. His patents
were infringed, and his invention only involved him in endless lawsuits.
At last he caught cold crossing the Hudson on a chill February day, and
died 1815, a good son, an inventor who has been useful to every one. He
has founded nations, and opened the distant seas to trade.