Volume IV Part 50 (1/2)

[1108] d.i.c.kinson: _Robert Fulton, Engineer and Artist_, 156-57; also see Thurston: _Robert Fulton_, 113.

[1109] See d.i.c.kinson, 126-32; also Knox: _Life of Robert Fulton_, 72-86; and Fletcher: _Steam-s.h.i.+ps_, 19-24.

[1110] d.i.c.kinson, 134-35; Knox, 90-93.

[1111] Act of March 27, 1798, _Laws of New York, 1798_, 382-83.

This act, however, was merely the transfer of similar privileges granted to John Fitch on March 19, 1787, to whom, rather than to Robert Fulton, belongs the honor of having invented the steamboat. It was printed in the _Laws of New York_ edited by Thomas Greenleaf, published in 1792, I, 411; and also appears as Appendix A to ”A Letter, addressed to Cadwallader D. Colden, Esquire,” by William Alexander Duer, the first biographer of Fulton. (Albany, 1817.) Duer's pamphlet is uncommonly valuable because it contains all the pet.i.tions to, and the acts of, the New York Legislature concerning the steamboat monopoly.

[1112] Reigart: _Life of Robert Fulton_, 163. n.o.body but Livingston was willing to invest in what all bankers and business men considered a crazy enterprise. (_Ib._ 100-01.)

[1113] Knox, 93. It should be remembered, however, that the granting of monopolies was a very common practice everywhere during this period.

(See Prentice: _Federal Power over Carriers and Corporations_, 60-65.)

[1114] Compare with his brother's persistence in the Batture controversy, _supra_, 100-15.

[1115] d.i.c.kinson, 64-123; Knox, 35-44.

[1116] Knox, 93; see also d.i.c.kinson, 136.

[1117] Act of April 5, 1803, _Laws of New York, 1802-04_, 323-24.

[1118] Act of April 6, 1807, _Laws of New York, 1807-09_, 213-14.

[1119] The North River was afterward named the Clermont, which was the name of Livingston's county seat. (d.i.c.kinson, 230.)

[1120] The country people along the Hudson thought the steamboat a sea monster or else a sign of the end of the world. (Knox, 110-11.)

[1121] Act of April 11, 1808, _Laws of New York, 1807-09_, 407-08.

(Italics the author's.)

[1122] d.i.c.kinson, 233-34.

[1123] _Ib._ 234-36. The thoroughfare in New York, at the foot of which these boats landed, was thereafter named Fulton Street. (_Ib._ 236.)

[1124] See _infra_, 414.

[1125] d.i.c.kinson, 230. From the first Roosevelt had been a.s.sociated with Livingston in steamboat experiments. He had constructed the engine for the craft with which Livingston tried to fulfill the conditions of the first New York grant to him in 1798. Roosevelt was himself an inventor, and to him belongs the idea of the vertical wheel for propelling steamboats which Fulton afterward adopted with success. (See J. H. B.

Latrobe, in _Maryland Historical Society Fund-Publication_, No. 5, 13-14.)

Roosevelt was also a manufacturer and made contracts with the Government for rolled and drawn copper to be used in war-vessels. The Government failed to carry out its agreement, and Roosevelt became badly embarra.s.sed financially. In this situation he entered into an arrangement with Livingston and Fulton that if the report he was to make to them should be favorable, he was to have one third interest in the steamboat enterprise on the Western waters, while Livingston and Fulton were to supply the funds.

The story of his investigations and experiments on the Ohio and Mississippi glows with romance. Although forty-six years old, he had but recently married and took his bride with him on this memorable journey.

At Pittsburgh he built a flatboat and on this the newly wedded couple floated to New Orleans; the trip, with the long and numerous stops to gather information concerning trade, transportation, the volume and velocity of various streams, requiring six months' time.

Before proceeding far Roosevelt became certain of success. Discovering coal on the banks of the Ohio, he bought mines, set men at work in them, and stored coal for the steamer he felt sure would be built. His expectation was justified and, returning to New York from New Orleans, he readily convinced Livingston and Fulton of the practicability of the enterprise and was authorized to go back to Pittsburgh to construct a steamboat, the design of which was made by Fulton. By the summer of 1811 the vessel was finished. It cost $38,000 and was named the New Orleans.

Late in September, 1811, the long voyage to New Orleans was begun, the only pa.s.sengers being Roosevelt and his wife. A great crowd cheered them as the boat set out from Pittsburgh. At Cincinnati the whole population greeted the arrival of this extraordinary craft. Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt were given a dinner at Louisville, where, however, all declared that while the boat could go down the river, it never could ascend. Roosevelt invited the banqueters to dine with him on the New Orleans the next night and while toasts were being drunk and hilarity prevailed, the vessel was got under way and swiftly proceeded upstream, thus convincing the doubters of the power of the steamboat.