| Matthias William Baldwin | ||
| by Frank Mitchell | ||
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(reproduced from Narrow Gauge No. 152 March
1999)
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Baldwin Works photos of No.15936 (above), and No.15937 (below). newly built to the order of Australia’s Victorian Railways. On arrival here they were classed NA, numbered lA and 2A respectively and placed into service in September 1898 on the Wangaratta—Whitfield line, then under construction. 1A was a simple expansion engine and was used as the pattern for the present Puffing Billy locomotives- PBPS ARCHIVES |
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MATTHIAS WILLIAM BALDWIN was born 10 December, 1795, the youngest of five children of William Baldwin senior, an Elizabethtown, New Jersey carriage maker. His father died when young Matt was just four years of age, his mother was left with nothing as the property was broken up through poor business transactions by the executors. His mother strived so he could finish school and he was then apprenticed to Woolworth Brothers, manufacturing Jewellers (1). In 1817 he was working for Fletcher and Gardiner, Jewellers and Silversmiths in Philadelphia. Two years later in 1819 he had established himself as a fine workman in his own business and devised a patent gold plating process, but he left this trade in 1825 to join David Mason, a machinist in the manufacture of engravers and book-makers tools; later expanding into hydraulic presses and forms of copper and steel rolls for the calico printing trade (2;BLC). In 1824 Baldwin had become a founder in the Franklin Institute for the Betterment of Labour. He practiced his philanthropic ideals in establishing a school for black children in 1835 and donated many funds to chapels and churches in the city. He was for many years county and city .prison inspector. expanded he built a noiseless stationary engine to replace an unsatisfactory one previously purchased. This engine was quite novel and served the works for many years, later being preserved by the company (3BLC/JNW) and eventually housed in the collection of the Smithsonian Institute, where it still resides. Mason apparently had reservations about Baldwin’s innovations (although this does not seem characteristic of Baldwin’s later locomotive development)(4JNW). The partnership was dissolved, Baldwin becoming the sole owner. At this time, in 1827, he married Sarah C. Baldwin a distant cousin. From this union there were three children – one son and three daughters(2). Philadelphia at this time was the hub of a booming coal mining region, relying on crude wooden railed tramways for transportation to the nearest waterway. This stimulated interest in the development of land transport to the extent Franklin Peale requested Matthias Baldwin to build a demonstration example of the new form of locomotion for railroad use. On April 25, 1831 Baldwin displayed in Peale’s Philadelphia City Museum a model ‘Dummy’ locomotive; (Zerah Colburn refers to this model as based upon the Novelty recently trialled at Rainhill, on the Liverpool & Manchester Railway) large enough to haul two small carriages, of four people in each, around a circular display track within the building (BLC/JNW). Unusual for its day, this loco burnt coal, (the local product) something that he persisted with for many years where others always used coke, that being the superior heat source and a smokeless fuel.
This exhibition aroused the interest of the regional railroads, at that time all still using horses for motive power. The six mile Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad (P.G.&N.) ordered its first locomotive from the works. Baldwin and Peale spent some time studying and sketching the recently arrived and still unassembled John Bull imported from Robert Stephenson & Co of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, for the Camden and Amboy (a heavy, iron railed line, to link New York with Philadelphia). The imported John Bull at this time resided in a shed at Bordentown, a Quaker settlement some 25 miles away, having arrived in August 1831 as a kit of parts. It was later assembled by Isaac Dripps a young machinist and marine engineer whom the President of the Camden and Amboy, Robert L. Stevens, had seen working on the largest steamboats then being built. Baldwin also became involved in the assembly of Delaware, the original Stephenson Planet type machine for the New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad AS 1907). It appears that this was the engine that became a prototype for his order to the P.G.&N. Railroad(RW5- 1989). Taking six months to build his early American steamer, with the assistance of Andrew Vauclain (the father of Samuel), who had acquired his experience with such machines by constructing steam fire pump engines, with ‘old’ Johnny Agnew of Philadelphia. There were many trials and such skills as were required had to be passed on to the workers. Constructed of iron and timber, this 51/2 ton machine was apparently capable of 28 m.p.h. and drew thirty tons, on fine days (BLC). Baptised as “Old Ironsides” it was dismantled for transport to the railroad and tested on 23 November 1832. The initial trials were favourably reported in the United States Gazette and The Chronicle; and advertisements appeared in Poulsons American Daily Advertiser, where it was advised that, “on rainy days it would not appear, for horses were to be used”; clearly indicating such machines were still to be regarded as novelties or experiments. A series of mishaps on its first run all the way to Germantown showed serious defects in wheel and axle arrangements. These consisted of a cast iron hub with wooden spokes, rims and wrought iron tyres. A driving wheel had slipped upon a hub causing out-of-gauge and locking up of the valve gears, primitive as they were. Other problems became evident since the cylinders had a common exhaust, causing much back pressure in the opposite engine. This arrangement was most unsatisfactory and was quickly modified. The applauded advantage of light weight advocated at the time soon showed that the locomotive suffered from lack of adhesive traction and was incapable of performing an efficient service on adversely graded lines. A dispute arose over the worth of the locomotive such that Baldwin declared he would never build another! (RLC/INW) However persuasion by other engineers and his own preoccupation with improvement soon brought forth new development. His second locomotive featured a leading four wheeled truck, the style and plan having been devised by John B. Jervis; and in use on the Mohawk and Hudson R.R.(JHW) This second engine of 1834. the E.L. Miller, entered service on the longest railroad in the world at that time, the South Carolina R.R. The 4-2-0 outside framed engine, with 'haystack' type firebox. became a standard Baldwin product improved conservatively over the next decade AS 1907] Where others were building bigger and better to improve haulage capacity, like Long and Norris. (Mr.Baldwin’s contemporary rival, with adjacent works) they turned out some remarkable machines, unafraid to purchase the patents of others where development had proven itself. Baldwin on the other hand sought to discredit others’ inventions, whilst discreetly trying to achieve the same improvements by alternative methods.(JNW) The Railway Mania’ of 1833 was coming to an end. However the standardisation of engines and good workmanship must have given Baldwin an edge over rivals. On the Columbia Railroad, 11 of 27 locos on the roster were Baldwins, and the superintendent’s report of 1836 was most scathing in respect of some of his motley collection of other charges. (AS 1907)
An annual output of forty-odd* machines was reached before the financial crises of 1837-40, this being weathered only by the tolerance of the shareholders. They must have been quite taken in by Baldwin’s arguments to stick it out and gave him three years to trade out of the mire. Indeed it is quite amazing that his reluctance to buy others’ successful patents, whilst striving to sell his own ultra conservative contraptions was not the complete undoing of the company (BLC/JNW). From 1842 the six coupled engine developed into the ‘Flexible Beam Truck’ (an early form of articulation) the following year and this innovation was patented by Baldwin and proven to be of superior haulage power. This device indeed hauled the company out of the financial quagmire of bankruptcy and saved the railroads’ increased operating ratios. The early history of what was later to become ‘The Standard Railroad of the world’. i.e. The Pennsylvania R.R. from 1847, was closely associated with Baldwin locomotives and the flexible beam truck engine that defied the engineering theory but worked in practice. Of this heavy freight hauler from the l840s and 50s. some survived into the l880s on the Louisville and Nashville R.R. (RR10/64) and indeed one was still at work in Cuba in 1906. Other partners from 1839 included Vail to 1842; then Asa Whitney from the Mohawk and Hudson River R.R., who left in 1846 to specialise in the manufacture of steel car wheels. Whitney was a very thorough business man who did much to manage the administration of the works. Mathew Baird, who had been a foreman within the organisation then bought an interest in the works as partner in 1854. It was Baird who experimented with soft coal burning and developed the brick arch that was adopted by all coal burners from then on. At Baldwin’s suggestion. his first travelling and commissioning Engineer, Andrew Vauclain, was recommended to the Pennsylvania R.R. ‘s new works at Altoona. where later Andrew’s son, Samuel. then became indentured. (See Narrow Gauge No 149, June 1998). Baldwin was still in some financial trouble leading up to the Civil War. as a boycott by the south came as a result of his philanthropic ideals, on behalf of the coloured people. His diminishing sales were compensated by the Union Government buying some 33 locos during the hostilities, between 1862 and 1864. (130 engines were built in 1864). By the end of the war, over 1500 engines had been constructed and the works by now had become the largest locomotive builders and exporters in the world. they would keep that title forever more in steam. Baldwin’s other interests extended well beyond his engineering establishment. Around 1826 he had become a Sunday school superintendent and conducted bible class for 35 years. Life at home in his residence at Wissinoming. Philadelphia was simple whilst $10,000 a year was donated to charity. During the hostilities of 1860~ 1865. he allocated 10% of the company’s annual income to the Civil War Christian Mission. An active man of athletic disposition, a keen archer and equestrian sportsman, he abstained from alcohol and worked up to a few days prior to his final illness and death on 7 September 1866.(2) Postscript:It was the standardisation of parts and design that caused our Victorian NAs to be promised an early delivery and look exactly as they did. lA and 2A may have been the first to be built to that exact specification: 10-20 1/4 D. However, I submit detail of other narrow gauge double-enders, slightly earlier in manufacture and with many similarities in appearance: (BPW, RRC Nos 4/6/7)
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