Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
© James E. Petts, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.
The little County Durham line built by George Stephenson and his son Robert was the place where the world’s railway infrastructure really began.
Read
© Andrew Curtis, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
The railway earned a special place in history as the first to be designed for steam locomotives only.
© Karl and Ali, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.
Jesus’s apostles receive the gift of God’s Holy Spirit, and the startling effects quickly draw a crowd.
Photo from NASA, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Sir William Herschel not only discovered Uranus and infrared radiation, but composed two dozen symphonies as well.
© Martyn Gorman, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.
Hermia and her lover Lysander elope from Athens, only to become tangled with squabbling fairies in the woods.
Photo from the Imperial War Museums, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
There was one form of power that self-taught engineering genius George Stephenson never harnessed.