Wallsend Waggonway (Wallsend Colliery)

Wallsend Colliery and the associated Wallsend Waggonway were a coal mine and tramroad on the north bank of the Tyne, near the Roman fort that gave the place its name. The colliery was famously productive in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, its coal a benchmark for quality on the London market, and was managed for many years by John Buddle (1773–1843), 'King of the Coal Trade', who served as the colliery's viewer.

Buddle, with the consulting engineer William Chapman, was responsible for the Steam Elephant of about 1815, one of the first twin-cylinder locomotives, built for the Wallsend Waggonway. The Steam Elephant survived only as a watercolour painting and as Chapman's chain-drive patent specifications until a working replica was built in 2002 and now operates at Beamish Museum.