dead engine
Like a beached, dead and rotting whale the firebox and boiler of this old engine lies, not prone for that would be face down, but sideways, without emotion, above and away from the Midland Line, on the up side of Arthurs Pass Village. Using conventional terminology that means on the Christchurch side, so despite the front end being at a higher elevation on the bank it is pointing down. Yes, arcane I know. But it is terribly important in the scheme of knowing whereabouts you've left you engine.
Consider this conjecture. You are reading this on a high speed communication system. Where it not for steam railways and their accidents you might be getting this message written on a postcard; next week, month or year. Note, also, the timestamp in the EXIF data. Before the advent of railways a place, say, Christchurch at one end of a route and Greymouth at the other might operate on different times, being relatively east and west of each other.
Running trains on single lines is fraught. If there is more than one train either travelling in the same or opposing directions a collision is very likely to happen. They did. I'm not saying this engine collided with something on the rails. It may have equally been derailed, causing that frontal deformation. What was needed was a means to both signal that a section of line was clear and to communicate from one location to another. Enter high speed communications!
Using the semaphore of the signalman was a great start. Using the handover of a staff, like a key or physical password, to allow the movement of signals and points was another effective tool to ensure that a section was cleared before it was entered by another train.
Early interest in telegraph likewise owes a great deal to trains and railways were early adopters of the telephone. Indeed data signifying actions along the line were passed by sequences of bells ringing over telegraph wires. How did the signalman or train controller know where and when an event happened? It was difficult when time zones were not standardised, and so the need for this type of information by railways drove the adoption of standardised time. Starting to make sense now about how your digital device was fast tracked by the impetus generated by the economics of rail transport over all other pre-existing forms and the preference for the avoidance of disasters?
Here in this brief description you see the importance of time, of password-like keys, and the transmission of data at a high speed, all of which are enabling your device and were triggered by the steam railway.
There is no plaque or memorial to commemorate this rotten old carcass. Yet it was she and her like who have changed our world irrevocably. Vale, old girl!
dead engine
Like a beached, dead and rotting whale the firebox and boiler of this old engine lies, not prone for that would be face down, but sideways, without emotion, above and away from the Midland Line, on the up side of Arthurs Pass Village. Using conventional terminology that means on the Christchurch side, so despite the front end being at a higher elevation on the bank it is pointing down. Yes, arcane I know. But it is terribly important in the scheme of knowing whereabouts you've left you engine.
Consider this conjecture. You are reading this on a high speed communication system. Where it not for steam railways and their accidents you might be getting this message written on a postcard; next week, month or year. Note, also, the timestamp in the EXIF data. Before the advent of railways a place, say, Christchurch at one end of a route and Greymouth at the other might operate on different times, being relatively east and west of each other.
Running trains on single lines is fraught. If there is more than one train either travelling in the same or opposing directions a collision is very likely to happen. They did. I'm not saying this engine collided with something on the rails. It may have equally been derailed, causing that frontal deformation. What was needed was a means to both signal that a section of line was clear and to communicate from one location to another. Enter high speed communications!
Using the semaphore of the signalman was a great start. Using the handover of a staff, like a key or physical password, to allow the movement of signals and points was another effective tool to ensure that a section was cleared before it was entered by another train.
Early interest in telegraph likewise owes a great deal to trains and railways were early adopters of the telephone. Indeed data signifying actions along the line were passed by sequences of bells ringing over telegraph wires. How did the signalman or train controller know where and when an event happened? It was difficult when time zones were not standardised, and so the need for this type of information by railways drove the adoption of standardised time. Starting to make sense now about how your digital device was fast tracked by the impetus generated by the economics of rail transport over all other pre-existing forms and the preference for the avoidance of disasters?
Here in this brief description you see the importance of time, of password-like keys, and the transmission of data at a high speed, all of which are enabling your device and were triggered by the steam railway.
There is no plaque or memorial to commemorate this rotten old carcass. Yet it was she and her like who have changed our world irrevocably. Vale, old girl!