(The following story by Paula Schleis appeared on the Akron Beacon Journal website on May 2.)
AKRON, Ohio — Talk about a career change.
For the first half of his life, Matthias William Baldwin was a jeweler and a printer.
But by the time he died, he was recognized as the greatest locomotive builder in the world.
Baldwin was 35 years old when a member of the Philadelphia Museum paid him a visit, griping about how America’s fledgling commercial railway system was dependent on English locomotives.
England had acquired 20 years of railway experience at a time when the United States was nurturing the steamboat.
But as young America marched westward, the country needed a system of transportation that didn’t limit growth to cities with ports. It needed trains.
Locals admired a steam engine Baldwin had built to power a shop where he made printing tools, and thought he might just be the man to build a miniature passenger railway to demonstrate at the museum.
One look at the inspired model, and the directors of Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad commissioned Baldwin to build a full-scale locomotive. In 1832, Baldwin gave them Old Ironsides. The 5-ton vehicle hit a speedy 28 mph on its test run, and remained in service for 20 years.
As orders for more locomotives came in, Baldwin worked on improving the design. In no time his iron horses were outperforming their English counterparts.
Before his death in 1866, the Baldwin Locomotive Works had 1,500 locomotives traveling down tracks in every corner of the globe.
Baldwin’s progressiveness was not limited to machinery. His experience in the printing industry — a primary tool of freedom — had made an impression on him.
He was in a brave minority that advocated giving free black men the vote in Pennsylvania. He founded a school for black children. In the years preceding the Civil War he was such a vocal abolitionist, the South boycotted his company.
He stood apart from his contemporaries in other ways. In biographical snapshots, the word “philanthropist” always follows the term “industrialist.”
He built churches and founded science institutes. He raised money for everything from caring for veterans to fostering the arts.
Baldwin’s company changed names several times as partners were added or dropped. It survived many financial difficulties, before and after Baldwin’s death.
But the Great Depression marked the beginning of the end. Orders diminished as the steam locomotive became obsolete.
There were a couple of last-gasp measures to turn the company around, but in 1956, the last of some 70,500 locomotives rolled off the production line and into history.