HUDSON AND FULTON.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9609, 1 October 1909, Page 3

HUDSON AND FULTON.

Great preparations have been made in New York to clebrate the threehundredth anniversary of Henry Hudson's exploration of America arid the hundredth anniversary of the successful use of steamers on the river that bears Hudson's name,' The ceremonies have now commenced, and they mark notable occasions in America's history. Henry Hudson, the noted English explorer, it is of interest to note, was one of the first seamen to seek the North Pole. In 1607 he was sent out by the Muscovy Company, in the Hopeful,' to sail across the Pole to the Spice Islands. He reached the east coast of Greenland in June; sailed northward along the coast latitude 73 deg., thence went along the ice barrier to Spitzbercren, reaching latitude 80 deg. 23min, and returned to England. In 1 1608 he attempted to find a northI west passage. On 25th March, 1609 he set sail with the Good Hop? and the Half Moon, in the servic. ol the Hutch East India Company, with the same object, but his crew mutinied, the Good Hope returned, and with the Half Moon he sailed 1 across the Atlantic to Nova Scotia. Thence he sailed southward, exploring tne coast as for 3 as Chesapeke Bay. In September he explored the great Hudson River, ascending il nearly to the site of Albany. In 1610 he sailedjin the Discovery to find a north-west passage, and enter • ed Hudson Strait and Hudson Bay. On his return his crew mutinied, and on 23rd June, 1611, he was bound, and with eight others, set afloat in a small boat on Hudson Bay. They were never seen again. Set alongside the name of Hudson in the American roll of honour is the equally iliuttrious name of Robert Falton, who did for steam navigation what James Watt did for the steam engine. He was an engineer, and was born at Little Britain, U.S.A., in 1765, and died at New York in 1815. Prom 1797 to 1805 he made a number of indifferently successful experiments with a submarine boat and a torpedo, most of which were conducted under the patronage of the French and British Governments. He launched a steamboat in the Seine in 1803, which sank from faulty construction. , A new boat built with the old ma- : chinery made a successful trial trip on the Seine on 9th August, 1803. Having returned to America, in 1806, jhe built the first successful steamboat, known as the Clermont. Subse- | quently, when renamed the Fulton, it made a satisfactory trial trip i from New York to Albany on the Hudson river un 11th August, 1807. This boat was followed by numerous river steamers and ferry boats built un<ler his supervision. In 1815 he launched the war steamer Fulton. Thus steam power was succesfully applied to navigation, and it is the memory of the man who put the principle into operation that is now being honoured in New York.