Imperial Prince's Railway
The railway of the imperial prince ( French Chemin de fer du Prince impérial ) was the first documented model railway system in the world handed down through photography .
Location
The 1859 for Napoléon Eugène Louis Bonaparte , the son of Emperor Napoleon III born in 1856 . , was located in a specially divided area (on the lawn between the Bassin des Trois Bouillons and the Bassin des Chiens ) of the park of Saint-Cloud Castle , the spring and autumn residence of Napoleon III.
description
A description of the railway system can be found in the magazine Le Monde Illustré of October 8, 1859:
“ The Imperial Prince's Railway. The railway, built for the amusement of the imperial prince, is a real toy and at the same time a masterpiece of mechanical science. It is located in a reserved corner of the Saint-Cloud park. Its route is in the shape of an 8 and the curvature of its 'microscopic' tracks is reminiscent of the amazing curves of the railway from Paris to Sceaux . It has its little train station , its little viaducts , its little bridges, its little inclines, its little ramps. Your locomotive , which is 50 centimeters wide, has wheels that are driven by the force of an internal spring that can be pulled open at will. "
A resulting photo of the plant and train , also the first known photograph of a model railway layout, shows that it is in the clockwork-driven locomotive to playing a 1B1-coupled tank locomotive acted, the two three-axle flat cars moved. It can also be seen that, beyond the figure eight-shaped route described in the article, there was a straight section that was accessible through two points inserted into the track arches , where the station building was located.
Lore
The article in Le Monde Illustré is the only known description of the Prince's model railroad. The accompanying illustration of the complete system is a wood engraving based on a photograph by M [onsieur]. Michelez , because at that time there was no method for print reproduction of photos in large numbers.
The photo that served as a template was the work of the Parisian photographer Charles-Louis Michelez (1817–1883). It was reproduced in Gustav Reder's book Mit Uhrwerk, Dampf und Strom (1970) as the earliest known photograph of a model railway system, although Reder knew nothing of the description in Le Monde Illustré and was therefore unable to provide any information about dimensions and drive type. He estimated the track width to be about 20 centimeters, with a width of the locomotive of 50 centimeters.
It is not known by whom this layout and its vehicles were built and how long the model railway existed in the park of Saint-Cloud. The train is said to have been part of the Museon di Rodo in Uzès . Its collection was dissolved, however, the whereabouts of the railway are not known.
Worth knowing
King Mongkut of Thailand received a model railway as a gift from Queen Victoria in 1856 , which was intended to advertise the purchase of British technology for the railway construction in Thailand that was to be expected in the future . This model train is exhibited today in the National Museum Bangkok .
swell
- Le Monde Illustré , issue of 8 October 1859 S. 229 - 230
- Gustav Reder : With clockwork, steam and electricity. From toys to model trains. Alba-Buchverlag, Düsseldorf 1970
Individual evidence
- ^ B. R. Whyte: Railway Atlas, Laos and Cambodia . White Lotus Co Ltd, Bangkok 2010, ISBN 978-974-480-157-9 , p. 1.
Coordinates: 48 ° 50 ′ 13.5 " N , 2 ° 12 ′ 48.7" E