Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 188, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 August 1915 — The Old and the New. [ARTICLE]

The Old and the New.

Inventions have a remarkable knack of repeating themselves. Among the" more interesting patents for 1914 la a specification for a wheelless rhotoi car, propulsion being by means ol skids, which are alternately lowered and raised. In the early days of locomotive history many inventors did not believe that sufficient adhesion was to be attained by a smooth wheel operating on a smooth rail, and weird and wonderful were the devices for overcoming this supposed defect. One ingenious engineer went so far as to design a contrivance in which jointed metal bars worked up and down on the rails after the fashion of a horse’s legs, and there seems to be a certain affinity between this device and tM motor car referred to above-