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Show there are more than 242,473 mile The first loco-motire loco-motire ever built ia the United State weighed little over fle tone. Now they are built to exceed 150 tone, but we beliere that the Pennsylvania rcd ha limited ite locomotiyee to eerenty tona, the heavier one pound out the track to tut. Could rotary engine be eabatituted, the locomotives locomo-tives on mountain roadi would probably inoreaae in size to 200 tons. We believe that Leland Stanford Stan-ford had the first looomotive of 100 tone built to handle trains over the Tebachapi pass, and all the bridges down that way had to be strengthened or rebuilt to run the monster safely. At first there were no Miller platforms, no air brakes, no telegraph, tele-graph, no signals, and tbe boilers of the locomotives locomo-tives had no appliance to test- the pressure of steam upon them. Moreover, no one knew how to construct a safe boiler. If an engine broke down anywhere on the road, no one knew its whereabouts, where-abouts, and when overdue, a man on horseback was sent out to find it. Now call up a train dispatcher dis-patcher who has sent out a hundred trains that day and be can tell you almost exactly where every one is. At first freight trains on a road 100 miles long were often forty-eight hours late, and roads were run a good while before trains were ever eent out at night. The aeroplane is less erode than waa railroading in its early history. EARLY XAILKOADING. Eighty-one years ago there were ninety-five wiles of railroad in the United ' State. Today |