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Thread: Stephenson?s Rocket

  1. #1
    Member bangorreg's Avatar
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    Default Stephenson?s Rocket

    Hi A bit of Liverpool history.
    William Huskisson ? The MP who was the first person to be killed by a train when he was knocked down by Stephenson?s Rocket at the opening of the Liverpool & Manchester Railway in 1830.
    How unlucky can you get?
    Reg.
    thaithyme

  2. #2
    paddy Paddy's Avatar
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    Default Rocket

    Forget the nice little pictures in your history books. The Rocket was pelted with rotten fruit on its arrival in Manchester, and the workers flew the French tri colour out their windows. The reason being they percieved it to be a machine that would further their enslavement and not lighten their load.
    Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
    Time held me green and dying
    Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

    Dylan Thomas

  3. #3

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    Quote Originally Posted by Paddy View Post
    Forget the nice little pictures in your history books. The Rocket was pelted with rotten fruit on its arrival in Manchester, and the workers flew the French tri colour out their windows. The reason being they percieved it to be a machine that would further their enslavement and not lighten their load.

    Ah but by the late 19th Century the railways enhanced the spread of affordable holidays to seaside and country for the masses.

    So really within a few decades they helped liberate the masses.

    John

  4. #4
    paddy Paddy's Avatar
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    Default Luddites and Progressives

    I am in agreement I was merely pointing out that there was class tensions in the age of steam and that inventions sometimes are seen differently. Take this medium the internet. Great isn't it? however it could be more and it could be used to benefit mankind more. I think in the end like the Rocket it will, as usual it is reduced to who owns the means of production or as in this case the means of communication
    Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
    Time held me green and dying
    Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

    Dylan Thomas

  5. #5
    Senior Member fortinian's Avatar
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    Default

    It wasn't only the workers who disliked the railways! In 1825 when the LMR Company first approached Parliament with their plans to build the railway many of the wealthy complained.

    The canal shareholders moaned about it stealing their trade, the stage coach men complained that they would be out of business. Even Lord Derby and the Earl of Sefton had their moan, as massive landowners in the area they claimed the noise would disrupt their livestock!

    Their complaints were upheld so the first time the Railway Bill went to Parliament it was defeated.

  6. #6
    paddy Paddy's Avatar
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    Default Rainhill Event

    When we got taught about the Rocket at school there was no mention of the death of Huskinson and the protests, just a picture of the machine and some figures in top hats. You can consider that to be innocent, yet it is what we think as people collectively and you could say it is the creation of an archetypal image.

    Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
    Time held me green and dying
    Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

    Dylan Thomas

  7. #7
    Senior Member fortinian's Avatar
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    Archetypal of what exactly?

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    Member bangorreg's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by fortinian View Post
    Archetypal of what exactly?
    Think Paddy has missed the train, take apart any strategic dilemma and you will find a basic struggle occurring between opposing forces; Quality vs. Speed; Time vs. Money, Risk vs. Reward; Stephenson's Rocket vs The Worker; These nine Archetypal Dilemmas offer thematic groupings of common struggles.
    Reg.
    thaithyme

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