John H. White, Jr., is senior historian emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution and professor of history and mechanical engineering at Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio.
Articles by this Contributor
Winter 2011
With the introduction of the steam engine, the Hudson River corridor became a hotbed of steamboat innovation -- and gave birth to the world's fastest vessels
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Winter 2006
A lone inventor and a lone crusader gave the world a safe device to hold railroad cars together Read >>
Summer 2003
ONE OF AMERICA’S FIRST PASSENGER TRAINS WAS RECORDED FOR POSTERITY WITH SCISSORS AND PAPER Read >>
Winter 2003
A historian explains why the Garden State is where all technology begins-or ends
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Summer 2002
HE WANTED TO BECOME RICH AND WELL CONNECTED. ALONG THE WAY HE INVENTED THE STEAMBOAT. Read >>
Summer 2000
A COMPARISON OF TWO MOUNTAIN RAILROADS Read >>
Summer 1995
THE SHOPS, YARDS, AND BUILDINGS OF THE EAST BROAD TOP were already antiques when the line shut down forty years ago. Since then they have stayed virtually untouched, and today they give the best picture available anywhere of how steam railroads went about their daily business. Read >>
Summer 1992
Amid the machine-made world of the Industrial Revolution, low-tech, horse-drawn street railways kept going into the air age. The reason: They worked. Read >>
Spring/Summer 1991
Railroads have thrived on moving freight for a century and a half. But today the nature of that business has been transformed. Read >>
