One early locomotive had legs. Scottish inventor William Brunton devised the “Mechanical Traveller” in 1813, giving it feet to grip the track on steep grades. It could creep forward at about 3 mph.

Popularly known as the “Grasshopper,” it hauled coal for about two years at the Newbottle Colliery until it ended its career with the first recorded railway disaster, a boiler explosion that killed 16 spectators. Brunton abandoned the project.