1829

Through a competition, the locomotive had its breakthrough. For ten days, some of the most advanced technological wonders of the time fought against each other. Both money and honor were at stake.

One of the earliest ventures into the new mode of transportation, the railway, can be found in the 1820s between the cities of Liverpool and Manchester in England. The fifty-mile stretch between the industries in Manchester and the port in Liverpool had so far been a bottleneck. There was also a growing interest in passenger travel with the new mode of transportation. Another novelty of the time was steam locomotives, but they were still few and generally unreliable.

The railway was scheduled to be completed in 1830. The year before, a decision had been made to hold a competition to determine the best and most reliable locomotive for the new line. The stretch chosen for the competition was about three kilometres long, near the village of Rainhill, about fifteen kilometres east of Liverpool. The prize money was high, 500 pounds, but even more important was the prestigious task of supplying locomotives to the new railway. The machines were required to run at least 16 kilometres per hour and be able to pull three times their own weight. Despite considerable interest, only five locomotives were registered when the competition began in October 1829.

But only two of the five locomotives met the requirements. These were the pre-favoured Rocket and the half-as-heavy challenger Novelty.

Over 10,000 spectators had gathered to witness the ten-day battle between the two steam locomotives, Rocket and Novelty. The competition was close but came to a sudden end. On the final day, a pipe burst in Novelty's boiler, and it was so badly damaged that it could not be repaired. The more reliable locomotive, Rocket, thus became the winner. Through this competition, the railway with locomotive propulsion had its definitive breakthrough.

The model is built in scale 1:16 and shows a small section of the competition track near the village of Rainhill.