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Fig1: The Vaucluse engine on display at the Western Museum of Mining and Industry in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
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... Including those in storage, these currently number thirteen, all but two of which were acquired in the UK. 123 A further seven beam engines that were 124 The 30-inch (6-foot stroke) Vaucluse beam and flywheel (originally two) engine formerly with the museum and now on display at the Western Museum of Mining and Industry in Colorado Springs, Colorado (see Figure 1), is of unknown maker. At work on a Virginia gold mine in 1844, however, it is said to have been imported from England in the mine's 1847 prospective and may well be one of the same size and description exported to a nearby gold mine by Harvey's of Hayle in Cornwall in 1835. ...
Beam engines introduced America to the steam age and powered the nation’s progress for much of the 19th century, spearheading the navigation of its inland waterways, powering its mills and manufacturing industry, enabling the mining of its deep mineral resources, and supplying its growing cities with water. Development of the beam engine in America lagged that in Britain and Europe but followed a similar evolution until its displacement by other forms of steam engine and by electricity at the end of the 19th century. Development started with the introduction of America’s first beam engine, imported from Britain in 1755, progressed through the rapid growth of American-built engines, and culminated in the mid- to late-19th century in the metropolitan waterworks of the American Midwest and East, in the deep mines of the American West, and in the paddle steamers that first brought America together.
