Part 2 of 4. Improvised parts, uncertain dimensions, broken wheels, missing copper, and repeated trial runs reveal what the Tom Thumb really was .. a working locomotive prototype built in iron and steam.

Part 1 of 4. The Tom Thumb experimental locomotive grew from a very large question: could the B& O Railroad rely on steam engines as it pushed west from a successful horse-powered beginning?

Before there was a county, there was a railroad The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad (B&O) was created in 1827 as Baltimore’s strategic answer to the new transportation economy forming around The National Road, canals, and western trade. The idea was simple but bold: build an all-weather, high-capacity railroad from the port of Baltimore to the Ohio Valley and the interior markets beyond. Decades before Garrett County existed as a political unit, the B&O was already building the phy