All About Inventions and Discoveries
The Romance of modern scientific and mechanical Achievements

go All About Inventions Electric propulsion of vehicles was brought within the range of possibility for the first time in 1870, when Gramme introduced the dynamo. True, it was a somewhat crude contrivance, but nevertheless it offered a new feature in the science of electricity, and provided a new field for experiment and research, of which full avail was taken, especially by the two brilliant workers above mentioned. Both attacked the issue from the point of adapting Gramme’s in- vention to electric propulsion, and both achieved success about the same date. At the Berlin Exhibition, held in 1879, one exhibit aroused the attention of all. This was what might be described as a kind of miniature railway running through the grounds. It was a short length of line, only some 600 yards in length, but it proved a powerful draw, the majority of visitors seizing the chance to make a trip over it. The railway became the focus of attention because of the novel locomotive which hauled the three trucks which provided seating accommodation for thirty passengers. It was a diminutive steed, mounted upon four wheels—in fact, was so small that the driver sat upon the top of it. But the little electric engine of 3 horse-power—for such it was—proved capable of hauling the full load at a speed of four miles an hour. Between the usual pair of rails was a third rail. This acted as the feed-rail, pumping electricity into the dynamo which acted as a motor, and the power generated by which was transmitted through gearing to the driving wheels. In the meantime, Edison was completing arrange- ments for demonstrating an electric locomotive which