Richard Trevithick was born in Illogan in Cornwall in 1771. When he left school he went to work with his father at Wheal Treasury mine. The owners noticed that he was good at engineering and so they promoted him to engineer of the Ding Dong mine in Penzance. While he was there, he developed a high-pressure engine which was used in mines across Cornwall and South Wales.

At this time, Richard Trevithick also became interested in the idea of building a steam locomotive. He began by looking at miniature engines and in 1796 he produced a working model. Following on from this, Trevithick next attempted to build a larger steam locomotive, which could be used for people to travel by road. He succeeded in 1801, when he produced the ‘Puffing Devil’, which carried people on short journeys. However, he was unable to find a way to keep up the steam for long periods of time.

Richard Trevithick travelled to London to show his invention to some scientists but to begin with he did not receive very much support as most thought the idea of using steam power was dangerous. In 1803, a company called Vivian & West did agree to help by giving him some money to do more experiments. However, the new locomotive that he built had lots of problems and so the company stopped funding him.

Shortly afterwards, Richard Trevithick found a new sponsor. His name was Samuel Homfray and he owned the Penydarren Ironworks in Merthyr Tydfil. In February 1804, Richard Trevithick produced the first steam locomotive in the world that could run on rails. It was called the ‘Penydarren’ and it completed a nine mile journey from Samuel Homfray’s Ironworks carrying ten tonnes of iron and seventy passengers. On this journey it reached speeds of almost five miles per hour. The problem was that on this journey, and on the two others that it made, it broke the rails that it was travelling on. Samuel Homfray decided that because of this he could no longer sponsor Richard Trevithick.

Richard Trevithick went back to Cornwall and after more experiments developed a new locomotive called ‘Catch Me Who Can’. In 1808, he brought this locomotive to London and allowed people to ride on it on a circular railway that had been set up at Euston Square. It reached speeds of up to 12 miles per hour. However, like the ‘Penydarren’, this locomotive also broke the rails.

With no funding, Richard Trevithick was unable to continue his experiments. When he died on 22 April 1833 in Dartford, he had no money left.