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Show NINETY MILES IN NINETY-CONSECUTIVE MINUTES. <br><br> The Baldwin locomotive works have just turned out a remarkable specimen of work intended for remarkable purposes. It is a passenger engine intended for the Reading road, to be run over the Bound Brook route between this city and New York, to which service it is expected to eclipse anything of the kind going. It has been built chiefly for speed, and, if the expectations of the contracting parties are carried out, the time between this city and New York over the above route will be lessened about half an hour. The distance from Philadelphia to New York is ninety miles, and the fast trains over both the Pennsylvania and Bound Brook roads have been making it in about two hours. The Reading people are aiming to make it in one hour and a half, and with this object in view they some time ago contracted with the Baldwin company to build them an engine that would perform that work, or, in other words, accomplish ninety miles in ninety consecutive minutes. The new engine has the largest pair of driving wheels, perhaps, of any passenger locomotive in this country, the wheels being six and a half feet in diameter. The ordinary driving-wheel of passenger engines has a diameter of from five to five and a half feet. The new engine is different in other respects, also, having but one pair of driving wheels instead of two additional smaller ones, as is the usual custom. It is also much heavier than the regular passenger engine; its weight is about 81,000 pounds, while the ordinary engine weighs from 70,000 to 75,000 pounds. It is expected to make the entire distance to New York without stopping to take water. That this may be done it is supplied with a tank of about twice the capacity of engines in general. It will hold 4,000 gallons of water. The capacity of the ordinary engine is from 2,000 to 2,500 gallons. The new engine, which was taken out of the works a few days ago and is now at Reading, will be put to use on the Bound Brook route within a week or ten days. Should the attempt to thus lessen the time between Philadelphia and New York prove successful, other engines will be built and put regularly on the road. - Philadelphia Times.<br><br> HOUSES BUILT BY WM. PENN. - The house on Leticia street, between Market and Chestnut, which was built by William Penn, for his daughter Leticia and in which she lived and died, has recently been purchased by J.A. Janney, who contemplates tearing it down for the purpose of making an addition to his warehouses adjoining. The building has been used as a saloon during the past twenty-eight years, and adjoining it is the old mansion once occupied by Penn, and which has also been occupied for some time as a saloon. An unsuccessful attempt has been made to purchase the last-named house. It was the first brick house in Philadelphia, having been built by Penn in 1682, the materials used in its construction having been imported from England. The firm has offered the Leticia House to the Pennsylvania Historical Society, with the privilege of tearing it down and removing it. Mr. George W. Childs has offered to bear the expense of removing the building to the park and having it erected in its original style, and his offer will undoubtly [undoubtedly?] be accepted as soon as the society convinces certain of its members as to the identity of the house, upon which point they seem to be incredulous. It is to be hoped that the Penn House will also be purchased, in which event the Mssrs. Janney offer to give it, too, to the Historical Society. - Philadelphia Bulletin. |