c-span.org/history. you can do our t schedule. preview programs. and watch. american history tv at c-span.org/history. c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by americas cable television companies. and brought to you today by your cable or satellite provider. each week, american artifacts takes you to museums and historic places to learn at american history. next we tour the railroad exhibit at the henry ford museum in michigan. transportation cure ya tor talks about the progression of american rail. an 1831 steam loco motive. and a 125 foot engine. that weighs nearly 400 tons. my name is math anderson.

we are here at the henry ford museum of innovation. we're in the railroad exhibit. as automobiles sp airplanes were the key transportation technology of the 20th century. the rail yoed was the major technology of the 19th century. it's not an exaggeration it was the equal of an astronaut. what we have here are railroad locomotives that tell the story of railroad in the united states from the earliest day ins the 1830s. to the 1920s. behind me is our earliest example. a replica of the 1831 locomotive and car on the moe hawk and hudson railroad. built in 1892. this gives us an idea of what steam locomotives and trains

look like in the 1820s and 1830s. the moe hawk and hudson located nd new york state and became a part of a railroad known as the new york central. one of the largest in the united states. railroads in the 1830s were small and local affairs. they might run 15, 20 miles between a couple cities. some had grander ambition of connecting the ocean with the great lakes or with the mississippi river. event we we got to the point. it took a few decades to grow into each other. to form a comprehensive national net work. people always shocked to see this locomotive and especially the cars they think the cars back there as being they look like stagecoaches on steel wheels. that's what they are. it took a few years to develop the standard railroad coach we know today. of course when the railroad was introduced they used the technology they knew. you could get a number of people

on them. they tended to rock and roll a bit traveling down the road. and railroad designers realize they could come up with a more efficient system. it wasn't too long, ten years or so they went to the standard rectangle box configuration. >> when the railroad was introduced in the 1830s it would have been fairly to travel on them. it would have been upper class men. transportation its was expensive. it would be about three cents a mile for transportation. of course we had the idea of separate classes of travel. so yet first class to pullman cars with the luxury appointments we think of. to what would have been immigrant class. perhaps nothing more than a simple wooden coach with wooden

bench seats. depend lg on your economic status you could travel. it's just you would be traveling either more or less comfort depending on how much you could pay far your fare. passenger and freight trains were largely using the same secnolose technology. the steam was. horses. it was within very few years the steam locomotive offered greater potential and carrying capacity. for many years railroads in the united states were defined by the 440 american type. we'll look at one in a moment. equally at home hauling passenger trains or freight trains and became the prominent symbol of the united states in the 19th century. the locomotive behind me is the quintessential. a 440. what those numbers are refer to are the wheel lay out.

the arrangement of the wheel. if you look at it there will four wheels up front under the pilot. behind the cow catcher here. and four driving wheels the wheel that is are powered by the rod zero trailing wheels. 440. we're talking about a 2666. obviously much bigger. many more driving wheels. but this is the locomotive i think even today most picture in our heads when we think of steam. the most popular type used in the second half ot 19th century in the united states. when we picture the golden spike. they were 440s. necessary we have one in the clebs. this locomotive was in on the atlantic and gulf railroad. and of course very expensive and railroads try to get as much as life as they can. but they age just like anything else. they become too under powered for heavier trains and service.

this would have been increase gle demoted to smaller service. not traveling on the main line anymore. when the locomotive came to the museum it was purchased by henry ford and put into service for the dedication ceremony. on the day he brought his closest friend. along with another guest of honor. herbert hoover. president of the united states. he renamed the locomotive the president. you see the plaque and the date. really at that time it was called the edson institute. this place founded as a tribute to him. i thought it was interesting the place opened october 21, 1929.

days before the stock market crashed. one of the last good days of hoovers administration. american railroads are distinguished from british railroads and britain is where we turn to in inspiration. but the big characteristic that is british railroads were well built. they often had stone bridges. substantial construction. they had really larger locomotives and fenced off right-of-way. in the united states of course we're always moving fast. go go go. so we don't spend time making things permanent. ou railroads were less expensively built. they tended to be rough and bouncy. part of the reason why the 440 worked well it could handle rough track. we build road bridges instead of stone. we didn't bother putting fence. and livestock wandered onto the track. it becomes a problem. the cow comes out on the short end of the conflict.

but the body could still be caught underneath the train and cause it to derail. the cow catcher is designed not so much to safely push the cow out of the way. it's really just to keep the cow from falling under the locomotive. and skauzing derailment. >> 440 again would require two crew members to operate. the engineer controlling the throttle and the brake. the fireman would be physically shoveling not coal but wood into the fire box. wood was the first widely used fuel on american railroads because it was abundant and easy to find. and cheap. we moved to coal by about the mid-19th century. it was more efficient. you could get more speed and power. this one still fitted with the wood. of course the other thing is water. and we take for granted we have water everywhere here. not so much in the west.

providing water got to be a challenge. railroads would have to built water towers or tanks at a specific number of miles between each point. and often you would pull into a station there would be a water tower nearby. as we moved into the late 19th century, some high speed railroads and passenger trains built track pans. they would built pans of water right between the rails and there would be a schooop. and scoop up water without stopping. needless they didn't work as well in the winter. they tried to heat the water. but it would freeze up in some harsh conditions. that infrastructure was another reason why the electric proved so popular. you didn't have to have the coal and wood or water. the locomotive fuelled up and was good to go. when we think about the passenger experience it would have been different from the

experience behind this locomotive in enclosed cars. there's not much protection. even if you're inside the stagecoach body. you'll get wet and cold. there's the matter of embers and sparks. and those fly. many would be small and wouldn't do much damage. some could be large enough to set clothing on fire. in the there are stories on the first ride opening umbrellas and things to protect themselves. that worked fine until the umbrella caught fire and burned up. so not very comfortable. this coach at least you have more prebs frotection. you would still if you open up the window the breeze was right you smoke catch a face full of smoke or soot. of course riding in a car we have the open plan where you go to britain they had private compartments. in the united states everybody was in the same car.

you would have some conflict with your seat mate. you might want the window open. he or she might want it cold. you might have somebody reading silently. you might have somebody reading loudly. you have other people singing just talking loudly. frankly, the way we fly on airplanes today. there's always somebody that's annoying. the crying baby or the person who wants to talk when you want to sleep. those kinds of issues turned up. which perhaps less difficult than your clothes catching on fire. when we think of the 440 this is the locomotive this is the engine that built the united states. when we talk about the west ward expansion. it could not have been without locomotives like this. without the railroad. and the other transcontinue tenial lines that followed. if you think about a symbol or the united states in the 19th century you could pick the buffalo and the 440.

both represent the united states at that time in our development. behind me is our 1942 chesapeake and ohio rail way. which is the high water mark for steam locomotive technology. they don't come much bigger or more powerful than this. this weighs close to 730,000 pounds. without the water and the coal. you add those and you're looking over a million pounds in weight. horsepower something like 7,500. so tremendously powerful. the problem is there's a practical limit to the size you can build a steam locomotive. any longer and it becomes too long to negotiate the curves and too heavy for bridges and structures. this is about as big as it got. this was designed to hold long coal trains through a particularly mountainous section of the main line in west virginia. and it's maybe not surprising

that this the it ld hold onto steam power as long as it did. by the 1940s the electric as proven itself in passenger service and freight service. they would invest in coal technology for a locomotive like this. this is i would say easily the most photographed object that we have in the entire museum. not a day goes by when i don't walk passed sp somebody is posing in front. i have a picture of myself in front of this locomotive. there's something about this thing. the size it just grabs people. what the heck is this? we love it. one of the most popular questions is how the heck did you get this into the museum. and it wasn't easy. it came here not under its own power. but on its own wheels. we have a track connects to an active railroad behind the museum. this was pulled here. and then pushed into our museum. not without first removing a few pieces from the side.

and not without removing the door and frame on the back of the building and pairbarely squd many. it's been here since 1956. and it's not going anywhere. >> this would have required two people in the cab. engineer and fireman. traditionally the fireman shovels the coal physically. with a locomotive of this size it's appetite is so great there was no way a human being could keep up with the demand. could not shovel enough coal. so instead it has an stoker automatic. it looks like a screw device that runs from the tender and pushes coal into the fire box. the fireman would be there but would be largely checking the fire. checking gauges and so forth. more so than doing the physical labor. it's hard to believe just two people could operate something this massive in size. >> altogether 60 of these were built. and they were built just in time

for world war ii. something of a golden age for american railroads in term of the service they provide. hauling war material to the coast for shipment over seas and also transporting troops and some were used to hold troop trains. carrying off to ships that transport them. for all of the technical sophistication of course they were entirely out of date within 15 years. the diesel proved itself not only more efficient but more flexible in how it could be used. steam if you needed to add power you could add additional locomotives but you have to add additional crew members to operate each. with the diesel you can string up as many as you'd like and be connected electronically. so one crew can operate them from the load. by the time this was operating. raid road sizes had been

standardized. shortly after the civil war 4'8" and a half inches was the standard. was fine. so long as railroads were local operations. but of course you create a national net work. it can't be done. because the wheels aren't the same wiftd apart. the m the move to standard gauge. that and the adoption of standard time. dh came later in the 1880s. prior to that people set their watches based on where the sun was at noon. local time noon. would be different than chicago or detroit. just ten miles away. when the railroads change that and operate schedules efficiently. we adopted standard time of course and it helped us move forward. we not only have these inside but out in green field village we have an operating railroad. a two mile track that runs

around. and we have a fleet of three steam locomotives. it's a tremendous experience. it's multi-sensory. the sound and the unique smell. and feel. and one of the questions we often ged is how come we never run the . two it would be tremendously expensive to make this operational again. three, this would be a bit over sized for hauling passengers around the village. and it just physically would not fit. it couldn't make the sharp curves and couldn't clear some of the buildings and station platforms we have. so as much as i'd love to sew one running again it's not going to happen here. steam requires almost constant maintenance. major repairs have to be done so often. but daily inspection of the locomotives you have to make sure there are no cracks or weak

spots in any of the bolts inside the loek motive or boiler. you have to inspect the boiler tubes inside that help boil the water to create the steam. mineral deposits can weaken the medal. that has to be cleaned and ash pans have to be cleaned too. a great deal of may want nans. labor intensive. as long as steam was the only game in town they lived with it. which the diesel comes on the scene in the 1920s and especially after world war ii, railroads see they can run for thousands of miles with very little maintenance. top off the fuel tank and that's it. they realize there are tremendous economic advantages. it's adopted and embraced quickly. locomotive mind me is perhaps not as handsome or pretty. but never the less it is equally as important.

this is a 1926 diesel electric. really one of the first diesel in widespread use on american railroad. when we talk about locomotives today we refer to them as diesel. general ri. that's not an accurate way. they are strictly speaking diesel electric. in other words the diesel engine in this doesn't directly power the wheels and make it go down the track. instead that diesel engine powers an electric generator and that is fed to a set of traction motors. one with each wheel set underneath. those traction motors. electric motors move it up and down the track. in the form of the motor power. very quickly diesel electric proved their worth. they required much less maintenance than steam. you didn't have to clean scale or ash. you didn't have to have the

infrastructure that steam required. no need for water tanks no need for round houses. in which the regular maintenance and inspection work could be done. top off the fuel tank and it goes for thousands of miles. never the less diesel electric made the in road on american railroad slowly. they started with smaller unites lib this. in switching yard. perhaps not even main railroads. it might have been owned by a factory or power plant. used to hold coal cars. it was by the 1930s the diesel electric started to move into passenger service. clean, modern and ultra efficient. popular with passengers. after world war ii they made the main light freight service. 1950s the diesel electric that replaced steam on american lines. this is what they look like in the first generation. they were revolution naary.

they reduced the maintenance and ebs pence. and the crew size. they were much easier on the track. when we think of steam we think of the side rods going back and forth. very cool to watch. but makes a terrible beating on your railroad track. these are much gentler to the track. and that was looked on favorably by railroads. we're looking at the front of the locomotive. interestingly it looks identical on the rear end as well. that's a big advantage. they would geared to operate equally well in either direction. a steam would work just as well in reverse. in term of power. the problem is it's hard for the crew to see when they are backing up. where as the diesel you can go either way and be fine. that was a big advantage. you see it doesn't have the cow

catcher. cow catchers kind of fell from favor by 1900. as really the nation was becoming less rural as a whole and railroads got around to fencing right-of-way. and frankly farmers were cognizant too. they started to do that. so it counters with livestock became rare. of course now you have to start worrying about encounters with automobiles. that's a separate issue. and requires gates and flashing lights and so forth. those appear more often. there was some concern about confusion. with the steam it's obvious to the whole crew which end is the front. move that engine forward everybody knows what direction you're speaking about. in this case with where it looks the same, that could be dangerous. telling them back up and go the direction you didn't expect them to move. if you look at the side there's a f painted up near the front.

that's what it means. it's simple. that's the front. which again is an important distinction. there was some hesitancy. not so much opt part of passengers. famously conservative american railroads. and hesitant to put a loft money into a new tech nol unless it's proved. the diesel was able to prove itself in smaller yard service and applications. before it moved to the main line. quickly it proved his worth so they were quick to adopt it. passengers were eager to adopt it because it looked so fresh so modern. especially into the 1950s you will see the streamline locomotives where they have the round slope faces. they looked fresh and cunning edge. this is a time too of course

when railroads are doing whatever they can to attract passengers. the highway system is starting to be built. everybody has a car in the garage. people are driving. and flying now. so the diesel locomotive becomes such a quick success because it comes at the right time. railroads had not been able to replace a will the of locomotives during the great depression or the war. they weren't being built during the war. at the same time they're pushing their ageing infrastructure harder than they did before. with the troop trains and war material. by the time the war ends and we get into the 1940s. railroads need to replace the locomotives anyway. it's only natural railroads turn to them and the steam fleet was retired as quickly as possible. it's remarkable to think of the effort and the work and design that went into the loek mote i have how impressive it is.

and to think it was built in 1942 and by 1956 it's a museum piece. it that happened that fast. >> visitors ask a loft questions about the trains. they ask sometimes why this looks so weird. and the fact is this is just an early example of a deseal electric. people didn't know what it should look like. there was no precon seefed idea. this is sometimes called a box cab. it really is practicality. in the purest form. and then controls up in front and back. over time locomotives became more refined. now when we see them they tend toch cabs up front and a long hood in back. and you don't just walk in it alongside the engine. you go inside. now day i don't say u flip open

panels to access a part of the diesel engine. also we look at this too. it's much shorter than modern locomotive. also today modern locomotives have platforms on the side and front. to get easy access to them. here you just have a few basic platforms. not particularly safe. that's a whole other issue too. visitors will ask why we don't operate these. the fact is that one these are museum pieces we're trying to preserve them. any time you operate something you tend to ware the original fabric. so the object becomes a little less original. also frankly there's a great deal of expense into bringing it back into operating capacity.

and there's just the issue of size. there's no way we could operate it. now we do have an operating steam railroad next door. we have a two mile track. we have three all 19th century vintage locomotives we keep in regular operating condition. we like to say are we preserving that experience. we're preserving the skills required to operate and maintain the locomotives. people aren't learning that anymore. so we tend to get people here rather young and they're drawn to the steam locomotives and want to get involved and we work them through the ranks. just like 150 years ago. you start as an assistant in the shop. cleaning up and helping. and work on the maintenance. and work your way up to fireman. shoveling coal. and an engineer. so it's kind of in smaller scale

we're preserving that system. of maintenance and repair. >> i do actually have a favorite. it's one that is actually out on the railroad. it's the 1897 bald win. it's beautiful 440. from the later 19th century. it's much bigger. we just put that back into operation. a few years ago. i love seeing it out there it actually looks a little larger than all the others. it's great it has a beautiful whistle. and it's the railroad crews will tell you compared to some others it's like dravliiving a cadilla. that's probably my personal favorite. i like the. the locomotives we have are perp innocent parts of the

collection. we have added a a few in recent decades. we have gotten rid of them because of the space they take up. and they were duplicating the stories we could tell. and that's an important concern with any smuseum. what story does it tell, can we tell the story better with something else. they have gone to other museums. they're still in the public eye. just not our collection. we have a diesel electric that we keep operating out in green field village. then we have a gasoline powered locomotive which is unusual. those are rare. this has a gas engine. it was connected to the wheel. it's not driving an electric motor. that's fun to see operate too. we have a turntable out there. that's hand powered it's not hooked up to any motor. if it's balanced pron properly

one person can turn the whole thing around. that's cool to watch too. we're trying to tell the story of the development of the railroad of the technology in the united states. and the growth. into a truly national system by the midto late 19th century. a part of every day american life. from a technology point of view we're trying to tell the story of the steam from the earliest. right on up through the peak of development in the 1940s. right up to the very introduction of the diesel electric. which of course will the replace the steam. it's a lot of ground to cover. we have to be judicious in doing it. we have so much space for the locomotives and cars and they take up quite a bit of space. we have tried to be selective. we have all of the major types and eras represented in our holdings here. we have only talked about a few

of the locomotives here. we have these and a couple others. and we have a number of cars too. we have 1850s pass jr. coach. typical of the civil war area. a couple freight cars. a refrigerator boxcar. and we haven't talked about much freight railroading. they changed the american diet. prior to that we had to eat fruits in season. with the advent of the railroad and refrigerator we could purchase fruit any time of year. grown around the world. and we have the caboose. we have a small red caboose. where the crew would have been station td on the train. and the conductor set up shop for his office. we have a nice selection that tell the story of american railroading in an efficient way. also an impressive way. >> you can watch this and other

american artifacts by visiting our web site. each week american history tv real america brings you films that provide context for today's public affairs issues. i would be glad to say a few words today. celebration of christmas. is not generally known this is the 11th consecutive christmas the division has observed in the far east. many far from battlefield throughout the far east. now the division has suffered and died for the principles of liberty and freedom. even as our lord suffered and died on the cross. for the principles of free dm of

worship and the salvation of the world. we hope that by next christmas our country will have won a just and honorable peace. on the battlefield, but throughout the entire world. and that we will be able then to spend the next christmas and experience the christmas spirit of brotherly lof with our loved ones at home. >> on behalf of the officers and man of the seventh infanty division, i would like to wish you all a merry christmas. thank you. >> merry christmas to you too, sir. thank you for speaking with us. >> ♪

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merry christmas! you can watch this and other american history programs on our web site. where all our video is archived. that c-span.org/history. up next. on american history tv real america. from 1947, don't be a sucker. this dramatized u.s. war department film uses the experience of an hung garn american. he recalls how similar speeches led to nazi persecution of minority groups and the eventual destruction of german society. this is about 20