Tom Thumb Lives!

You may have noticed I’ve been on a train kick lately. There’s a reason for that, but we’ll save that for another day.

I’ve gotten to know an amazing guy who knows everything—and I mean everything—about trains. Show him a fragment of an axle and he’ll probably pop off with the manufacturer, model, and date. He’s good, and so it’s been great fun digging rather deep into the history of the railroads at various theme parks.

But…let’s back up just a bit. In the early 70s the Marriott Corporation decided to jump into the red hot regional theme park craze. They had the resources to do it right, and the two parks that came to life were the crown jewels of the Randall Duell era. Great America in CA and IL were beautiful, and of course they both featured trains. All the parks did. There were two locomotives at each location, one red, the other blue, and they were fake steamers. Steam outlines, they’re called. Looks real, sounds real, even belches steam. But they’re driven like a truck, running off a diesel and standard transmission.

But that’s not the point. There was one other contraption, a reproduction of an antique steam locomotive known as “Tom Thumb.” It’s a strange beast, and in 1830 the original was on the leading, bleeding edge of the Industrial Revolution. Everything was still horse-powered in those days, and the Stockton & Stokes stagecoach company wasn’t any too happy about some newfangled thingamabob taking over their business. So they challenged Peter Cooper, Tom’s inventor, to a showdown between Baltimore and Ellicott City, MD.

Out of the gate the horse surged ahead. Little Tom struggled, working to build up steam and speed. But…slowly…the little engine that could caught up and then eked out a slim lead. The crowd cheered. Until a blower belt broke, leaving Tom gasping and wheezing, slowly gliding to a stop. The horse won that day, but it was a fleeting victory, with steam power dominating from then on.

What’s that got to do with theme parks? Marriott had their Tom Thumb replica on display in Gurnee while they were planning their third park outside Washington, DC. After multiple rejections for project approval, they gave up and went home. Soon after this a local Howard County historical group wanted to borrow the little gizmo. Marriott’s response?

“Unfortunately, the people of Howard County expressed their belief, through their elected officials, that Great America would be an unsatisfactory neighbor—on not one, but two occasions. I hope you can understand, then, our reluctance to share the fruits of our labor by way of providing our Tom Thumb replica. It was to have operated daily, carrying people, had we been able to build our park in the county.”

Marriott was not a happy camper, and for good reason. At any rate, now we get to the point of our story. During our research into park railroads, I had mentioned this to my new friend. Some weeks later he sends me a screenshot from someone taking a ride on the Great America (Six Flags) railroad a couple of years ago.

Unbelievable! That’s Tom Thumb, and I guarantee nobody there has a clue where it came from or what the backstory is. But now you know.