George Stephenson

Born	9 June 1781
Died	12 August 1848
Nationality	English
Employer	Killingworth Colliery (engine-wright); Stockton & Darlington Railway (Engineer); Liverpool & Manchester Railway (Engineer); Robert Stephenson and Company (founder)

Summary: George Stephenson was a famous British mechanical engineer and civil engineer. He is most famous for building the world's first intercity railway line which was opened in 1830 and linked the British cities of Liverpool and Manchester. He was also famous for selecting the 4 feet 8½ inches (1,435 mm) gauge for the railway line which became the standard gauge for railways across the world, not just in Great Britain! It is often referred to as the Stephenson gauge.

Discover interesting facts about this English engineer who developed the railways in Great Britain significantly during the Victorian era. Known as the 'Father of the Railways', he had a son called Robert who also became a famous engineer and was later regarded as one of the greatest engineers of the 19th Century.

George Stephenson Fact Sheet: Who was George Stephenson? The following short biography and fact sheet provides interesting facts about the life, times and history of George Stephenson, the famous English engineer.

He was born during the Victorian era of British history on June 9, 1781 in Wylam, Northumberland in England.

He was a mechanical engineer and civil engineer. He was most famous for building the world's first railway line that connected one city to another. It was used to transport goods and passengers via steam locomotives.

His parents were called Robert and Mabel Stephenson and they were both illiterate. He didn't attend school as the family didn't earn enough money to afford him an education. His father earned a low wage as a fireman in Wylam.

He began working for Water Row Pit in Newburn as an engineman at the age of seventeen. The money that he earned meant that he could pay for an education for himself. He was illiterate when he began working for Water Row Pit and having recognised the importance of education, he paid for lessons at night school in reading, writing and arithmetic.

He started working as a brakesman at Black Callerton Colliery in 1801.The job involved controlling the pit's winding gear.

He married Frances Henderson in 1802. The couple moved to a room in a cottage in Willington Quay where George Stephenson found work as a brakesman. He earned an additional income by fixing clocks and making shoes.

He had two children with his wife, Frances. Their first child was a daughter who sadly died a few weeks after being born. Frances gave birth to a healthy son called Robert in 1803.

Following the death of his wife, Frances, in 1806, he moved to Scotland to find work. His son, Robert, was left in the care of a local lady. George Stephenson soon returned home, he moved to West Moor with his sister, Eleanor, who cared for Robert.

He was promoted to enginewright in 1811 after fixing the pumping engine at High Pit, Killingworth. His responsibilities included repairing and looking after the colliery engines. Steam powered machinery became an area of expertise for George Stephenson.

He was treated unfairly at times because others could not comprehend how an uneducated man could come up with such great inventions. It was for this very reason that George Stephenson decided that his son Robert would be privately educated so that he would be spared of this unjust treatment.

He invented a safety lamp contained within a glass cylinder which allowed air to enter via small holes. He presented his safety lamp invention in 1815 but due to his lack of education and scientific knowledge, he was accused of copying Humphry Davy's invention. It wasn't until 1833 that his idea was found to have equal claim to Davy's.

In 1814, he invented his first steam locomotive which was designed to haul coal on the Blücher (the Killingworth wagonway). His design was demonstrated on Matthew Murray's locomotive Willington which was constructed behind Stephenson's home in a workshop.

The first steam locomotive he invented was capable of pulling 30 tons of coal uphill at 4 miles per hour (6.4 km/h).

His steam locomotive invention was the first functioning flanged-wheel adhesion locomotive; the traction was dependent on contact between the rail and the locomotives flanged wheels.

The majority of his steam locomotive inventions were built for use at Killingworth Colliery or Hetton Railway. There are no records as such to prove exactly how many locos he invented; however, it is believed that sixteen were produced in total.

In 1817, he built a six wheeled locomotive for the Kilmarnock and Troon Railway. However, damage to the cast iron tracks resulted in the loco being removed from service. A similar thing occurred again in 1817 when another of his locos was withdrawn due to damage to the rails and because it was under boiled.

He worked with William Losh in an effort to strengthen cast iron rails by developing their design in order to reduce damage and breakage. He attempted to cushion the weight on the cast iron rails with the use of steam pressure but found better results through distributing the weight with the use of more wheels.

In 1820, he began building the first railway that would not be powered by animals, this was known as the Hetton colliery railway which would be 8 miles (13 km) long. Gravity and downward inclines would combine to help it to function successfully.

His son, Robert, became managing director of Robert Stephenson and Company. The company was founded by George Stephenson and Pease. The company built a number of steam locos, the first was the 'Active' locomotive which was later renamed the 'Locomotion'; the Hope, Diligence and Black Diamond designs followed. Robert Stephenson and Company supplied the steam locomotives to the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

George Stephenson selected the 4 feet 8 1⁄2 inches (1,435 mm) gauge for the line which became the standard gauge for railways across the world! It is often referred to as the Stephenson gauge.

He built the world's first intercity railway line linking the British cities of Liverpool and Manchester by railway. The line was opened in 1830.

He was an incredible engineer who impacted greatly upon the history of railways in Great Britain and the rest of the world. He was nicknamed the 'Father of the Railway'. He died on August 12, 1848 at Tapton House, Chesterfield, Derbyshire in England. He was buried at Holy Trinity Church in Chesterfield.

Biography

George Stephenson (1781–1848) was an English mechanical and civil engineer, often called the 'Father of Railways'. His use of a standard rail gauge of 4 ft 8½ in for the Stockton & Darlington and Liverpool & Manchester railways made it the world standard, and his locomotive Rocket, designed jointly with his son Robert, won the Rainhill Trials of 1829 and shaped the form of the steam locomotive for a century.

Stephenson was born at Wylam, eight miles west of Newcastle upon Tyne, on 9 June 1781, the second son of a colliery fireman. He was illiterate until the age of 18 and paid for his own night-school tuition out of his wages mending shoes and cobbling clocks. By 1812 he had risen to Engine-wright at Killingworth Colliery, where in 1814 he built his first locomotive, Blücher, for hauling coal wagons. A succession of Killingworth and Hetton engines followed, including the eight-wheeled Hetton Colliery locomotives of 1822, the first railway worked entirely without animal power.

In 1821 he was appointed Engineer to the new Stockton & Darlington Railway, which opened on 27 September 1825 with his locomotive Locomotion No. 1 hauling the inaugural train. Three years later he and his son entered the Liverpool & Manchester Railway's Rainhill Trials with Rocket, whose multi-tubular boiler, blastpipe exhaust and direct cylinder-to-wheel drive together established the basic anatomy of the steam locomotive.

The L&MR's opening on 15 September 1830, the world's first inter-city passenger railway, was the moment from which modern railways are usually dated. Stephenson then served as Engineer to a string of major British and continental projects: the North Midland, the York & North Midland, the Manchester & Leeds, and lines in Belgium and Spain. With his son he founded Robert Stephenson and Company at Newcastle in 1823, the world's first locomotive-building works, which built engines for railways across Europe and North America.

He retired to Tapton House near Chesterfield in 1845 and died there on 12 August 1848. He was buried at Holy Trinity Church, Chesterfield. The L&MR's adopted gauge of 4 ft 8½ in (1,435 mm) is now used by 60 per cent of the world's railway mileage and bears his name informally as 'Stephenson gauge'.

Locomotives designed

Blücher — George Stephenson's 1814 locomotive, the first engine he designed and built, working at Killingworth Colliery on Tyneside. Blücher was the engine that established Stephenson's reputation as a locomotive engineer and launched the career that would lead to the Stockton & Darlington Railway in 1825 and the Liverpool & Manchester Railway in 1830. Named after the Prussian Field Marshal Gebhard von Blücher (allied with Wellington against Napoleon), the engine demonstrated successfully that flange-wheel adhesion could be used on properly-laid edge rails. Blücher worked at Killingworth from 1814; no original survives.
Diligence — An 1827 George Stephenson 0-4-0 built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, broadly similar to Hope of the previous year. One of the longer-serving Hetton engines.
Experiment — An 1826 0-4-0 built by Robert Stephenson & Co. for the Stockton & Darlington Railway, distinguished as the first locomotive specifically intended to haul passengers as well as coal. It hauled the railway's pioneering passenger coach "Experiment" — from which the locomotive took its name — on the world's first regular steam-hauled passenger service.
Hetton Colliery Wilberforce — An 1822 George Stephenson 0-4-0 built for the Hetton Colliery Railway and named after the abolitionist William Wilberforce. The most celebrated of the Hetton engines: rebuilt at intervals through the 19th century, it remained in working order for over 50 years and was exhibited at the Stephenson Centenary in Newcastle in 1881.
Hetton Colliery locomotives — A family of 0-4-0 locomotives designed by George Stephenson for the Hetton Colliery Railway in County Durham, which opened in 1822 as the first railway worked entirely without animal power. The Hetton engines pioneered the layout — long boilers, simple coupled wheels, edge-rail track — that Stephenson would refine for the Stockton & Darlington Railway and ultimately for Locomotion No. 1.
Hetton Dart — One of the original 1820 George Stephenson 0-4-0 locomotives built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, part of the family of engines that worked the line from its 1822 opening. See Hetton Colliery locomotives for the design and operation history of the class as a whole.
Hetton Hetton — One of the original 1820 George Stephenson 0-4-0 locomotives built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, part of the family of engines that worked the line from its 1822 opening. See Hetton Colliery locomotives for the design and operation history of the class as a whole.
Hetton Star — One of the original 1820 George Stephenson 0-4-0 locomotives built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, part of the family of engines that worked the line from its 1822 opening. See Hetton Colliery locomotives for the design and operation history of the class as a whole.
Hetton Tallyho — One of the original 1820 George Stephenson 0-4-0 locomotives built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, part of the family of engines that worked the line from its 1822 opening. See Hetton Colliery locomotives for the design and operation history of the class as a whole.
Hope — An 1826 George Stephenson 0-4-0 built for the Hetton Colliery Railway, an enlargement of the earlier Hetton pattern. Worked the colliery sections alongside the original 1820–22 engines.
Invicta — Robert Stephenson's 1830 locomotive for the Canterbury & Whitstable Railway, the world's first commercial passenger steam locomotive (the C&W opened 3 May 1830, four months before the Liverpool & Manchester Railway). Built by Robert Stephenson and Company at Newcastle to a development of the Rocket design with horizontal cylinders, Invicta proved underpowered for the railway's gradients and was withdrawn after only six years. The engine was preserved on withdrawal and is currently displayed at the Whitstable Museum, having previously been at the Canterbury Heritage Museum.
Killingworth Billy — George Stephenson's 1816 locomotive, the second engine he built at Killingworth Colliery on Tyneside, following Blücher of 1814. The engine worked at Killingworth Colliery for approximately 65 years before being retired in the late 1880s, and is one of the oldest surviving Stephenson-built locomotives. Currently preserved at the Stephenson Railway Museum, North Shields, the engine is a key historical artefact representing Stephenson's transitional engineering between his first Killingworth engines and the Stockton & Darlington Railway designs.
Lancashire Witch — Robert Stephenson's 1828 locomotive for the Bolton & Leigh Railway, a transitional design between the early colliery engines and the Rocket of 1829. Lancashire Witch introduced the inclined-cylinder arrangement that would feature on Rocket, and used a primitive multi-tube boiler arrangement that was a precursor of the multi-tube boilers Rocket would make famous. The engine worked the Bolton & Leigh Railway from 1828, including a brief loan to the Liverpool & Manchester Railway during construction, and was scrapped in approximately 1842. No original survives.
Locomotion — George Stephenson's 1825 locomotive, the engine that hauled the opening train of the Stockton & Darlington Railway on 27 September 1825, the world's first public passenger steam railway. Built by Robert Stephenson and Company at Newcastle to a design by George Stephenson, Locomotion (originally numbered 1, often known retrospectively as "Locomotion No. 1") combined direct connecting-rod drive with two vertical cylinders set into the boiler. The engine worked the S&DR until 1841 and was preserved as a static exhibit thereafter. Currently a centrepiece exhibit at Locomotion: The National Railway Museum, Shildon, County Durham.
Northumbrian — Robert Stephenson's 1830 development of Rocket for the Liverpool & Manchester Railway, the engine that hauled the directors' inaugural train at the line's opening on 15 September 1830, and that carried the fatally-injured William Huskisson MP at speed to Manchester after his accident at Parkside. Northumbrian incorporated improvements over Rocket including a horizontal cylinder arrangement, a separate firebox more substantially water-jacketed, and a smokebox at the front of the boiler, all features that became standard on subsequent designs. No original survives.
Rocket — Robert Stephenson's 1829 locomotive, the engine that won the Rainhill Trials of October 1829 and inaugurated the modern railway age. Built by Robert Stephenson and Company at Newcastle to a design by Robert Stephenson with his father George Stephenson, Rocket combined three innovations that made it decisively faster and more reliable than its competitors: a multi-tube boiler with 25 copper firetubes, a separate firebox surrounded by water, and a blast pipe directing exhaust steam up the chimney to draw the fire. The engine won the Rainhill prize of £500 and the contract to supply locomotives to the Liverpool & Manchester Railway, which opened the following year as the world's first inter-city passenger railway. The original engine survives at the Science Museum, London.
The Duke — A 1817 0-4-0 locomotive built by George Dodds and William Stirling at Kilmarnock for the Kilmarnock & Troon Railway, the first locomotive to operate in Scotland. It worked only briefly: its weight cracked the line's cast-iron edge rails, after which the railway reverted to horse haulage until heavier rails were installed.