Early American locomotive promoters in 1830 decided to prove the superiority of steam technology by racing their famous Tom Thumb train against a literal horse on parallel tracks.

A closer look

Early American locomotive promoters in 1830 decided to prove the superiority of steam technology by racing their famous Tom Thumb train against a literal horse on parallel tracks. Despite the heavy marketing hyping up the relentless power of steam and steel, the crude locomotive violently snapped a mechanical belt halfway through the race and the biological horse easily galloped to victory. It was a massive, humiliating public relations disaster for the concept of mechanized transit, basically confirming to stubborn traditionalists that burning coal was a stupid passing fad. The inventors were forced to aggressively downplay the loss, frantically upgrading their engines just to ensure they would never again be outperformed by a farm animal with a decent stride. Even today, the legacy of this embarrassing defeat haunts us every time a highly advanced, multi-billion-dollar transit system is completely paralyzed by a small pile of wet autumn leaves on the tracks