Background
Curr was born in County Durham, England in around 1756.
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John Curr
Edit ProfileCareer
During this time he made a number of innovations that contributed significantly to the development of the coal mining industry and railways. The career of John Curr has been subject to significant dispute, due to inaccurate statements by early authors about him and misinterpretation. Older works (such as (or those quoting them) often give the date of his colliery inventions as 1776.
Curr probably came to Sheffield in 1778.
That August, shortly before the expiry of the lease of Sheffield colliery (in Sheffield Park), he wrote a report on it for the Duke of Norfolk. From Michaelmas 1779, he became superintendent of the Duke"s Coal Works.
In 1787, John Buddle, senior reported on the transport system introduced by Curr. He reported Curr"s method using L-shaped cast iron plates cost 6¼d per waggon, whereas the old method cost 10½d per waggon, a saving of 3¾daughter
He also referred to Mr Curr"s method of "drawing 2 corves abreast up a shaft 8½ to 9 foot diameter by means of steadying conductors".
Curr substituted small four-wheeled carriages for the sledges that had previously been used to transport coal underground, but this meant that underground haulage by boys, rather than ponies. The corf wheels and "roadplates" came from Binks, Booth, and Hartop"s nearby Park Ironworks. The use of these rails was subsequently promoted by Benjamin Outram and adopted at many other English mines, quarries and ironworks.
In south Wales, railways using his system were known as tramroads (or dramroads).
Today, the term plateway is sometimes applied to them.
