The Great
Western, on the contrary, had coal to spare.
Two innovations in shipbuilding were soon introduced.
These were the building of iron instead of wooden ships and the
replacing of the paddle wheel by the screw propeller. The
screw-propeller was first successfully introduced by the famous
Swede, John Ericsson, in 1835. His propeller was tried in a
small vessel, forty-five feet long and eight wide, which was
driven at the rate of ten miles an hour, and towed a large
packet ship at fair speed. Ericsson, not being appreciated
in England, came to America to experiment. Other inventors
were also at work in the same line.
Their experiments attracted the attention of Isambard
Brunel, one of the greatest engineers of the period, who was
then engaged in building a large paddle-wheel steamer, the
Great Britain. Appreciating the new idea, he had the engines
of the new ship changed and a screw propeller introduced.
This ship, a great one for the time, 322 feet long and of
3443 tons, made her first voyage from Liverpool to New York
in 1845, her average speed being 12 1/4 knots an hour, the
length of the voyage 14 days and 21 hours.
By the date named the crossing of the Atlantic by steamships
had become a common event.
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