Trains Build Nations
1804 AD
1804 1804
05.39W50.12N
SCI

ILLOGAN, CORNWALL, ENGLAND
	During much of the last century, it didn't matter if the clocks in New York were set at a somewhat different time than the clocks in Trenton, New Jersey. After all, why would a New Yorker care what time it was in Trenton?
	That all changed with the coming of the train. For train schedules to make sense, there had to be standard times. This eventually led to the creation of a worldwide system of time zones.
	But Standard Time was just one of the changes caused by English engineer Richard Trevithick when he built the first steam locomotive in 1804.
	On his train's first trip, the little one-cylinder locomotive pulled 70 men in five wagons for 10 miles at a slow two-and-a-half miles an hour. It was a small beginning, but a big advance in the steam revolution begun by James Watt.
	Trevithick's invention caused tremendous social and economic changes. Before the railroads, nations were collections of semi-independent towns and villages, but the trains tied them together and strengthened nationalism.
	Also, trains lowered the cost of transporting goods, so businesses could sell their products over much larger areas. This led to the growth of huge corporations.
	Of course, not everybody was pleased with the coming of the trains. The Bavarian College of Physicians in Germany, for example, predicted that the rapid movement of trains would cause brain disease, both for train travelers and onlookers.
	Though there is no evidence that trains cause brain disease, trains -- like other modern transportation methods -- gave people the ability to quickly move far from home, thereby hurting family and community ties.