. Electric railway gazette . taking up in detail andpiecemeal the difficulties and objections sought for and to beovercome. Then followed the difficulties and delays of enlist-ing capital in a scheme which had never been tried and atwhich even friendly-disposed engineers shook their headsand gave wise counsel to their friends to let some others putin their money and do the experimenting. The moneywas finally raised and the work was begun at once. Theessential requisites of a street railway on the plan I pro-posed were, Mr. Hallidie continued, that the car couldbe stopped and started on any par
. Electric railway gazette . taking up in detail andpiecemeal the difficulties and objections sought for and to beovercome. Then followed the difficulties and delays of enlist-ing capital in a scheme which had never been tried and atwhich even friendly-disposed engineers shook their headsand gave wise counsel to their friends to let some others putin their money and do the experimenting. The moneywas finally raised and the work was begun at once. Theessential requisites of a street railway on the plan I pro-posed were, Mr. Hallidie continued, that the car couldbe stopped and started on any part of the street; that thecable for hauling the car should be kept entirely below thesurface; that there should be no opening in the street largeenough to let a buggy tire into, and that no obstructionto the ordinary surface travel in the crowded streets of acity should exist. The grip originally designed by me wasintended to obviate the necessity of making vertical orhorizontal deflections in the roadbed or rails, or in any. way changing or defacing the surface line of the I accomplished perfectly, by providing a horizontaland vertical motion in the grip, which permitted the tracksto be kept in a true line and flush with the normal line ofthe street. These grips are in operation at this day onClay Street. The first trial trip and first public exhibition took placeon Aug. 1, 1873. Of the former, Mr. Hallidie says: Themorning was foggy and gray, and, when ready to pick upthe rope, the man who had been placed in charge of thegrip showed such signs of fear that I was compelled to takehis place, pick up the rope and take the car down the the way down, we threw off the rope and picked it uprepeatedly; slacked the grip, stopped the car and ran itback, and made such experiments as opportunity the terminus at Kearny Street the car was turnedaround and transferred to the up track and taken up thehill without any difficulty or delay. At the top of the hill,
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1895
