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Excerpt from The Pennsylvania Railroad: Its Origin, Construction, Condition, and Connections; Embracing Historical, Descriptive, and Statistical Notices of Cities, Towns, Villages, Stations, Industries, and Objects of Interest on Its Various Lines in Pennsylvania and New Jersey
Up to 1825 the railroads constructed had been exclusively used for the transportation of coal and other heavy products, and were confined to private use only; but about this time it was proposed to build them for pur poses of general traffic and travel, and it was for this that the Liverpool and Manchester was constructed, being the first of the kind in the world. This road was not completed until 1829; but the experiment of transport ing passengers and merchandise on a railroad by locomotives had been practically tested on the Stockton and Burlington road, of which Mr. Stephenson was chief engineer, in 1825. This was a coal road, but running as it did between the towns of Darlington and Stock ton, a distance of twelve miles, it afforded an opportunity to test the experiment. Travel over it soon became popular and profitable to the company. A year later locomotives were successfully placed by Mr. Seguin, a French engineer, on a railroad run ning from Roan ne (via St. Etienne) to Lyons. Little is known of this early French experi ment, but Mr. Seguin made several important improvements to the locomotives then in use.
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