In 1906, a farmers J.W. and E.C. Fawkes formed the Aerial Trolley Company Co., Inc. and put a monorail-like trolley in their Burbank farm.
Is this real-life steampunk? I believe so. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the utter coolness of even the company name, Aerial Trolley Company Co., Inc. It’s like something from a Jules Verne novel.
Excellent information and photos USC Digital Library tell us that the Fawkes patented and built this aerial trolley as an experimental transport system that never quite materialized. It later was called “Fawkes’ Folly.”
Aerial Trolley Drawings and Patent
Fawkes patented the trolley, and these drawings give us some of the crispest views of how the trolley worked:
Close-Ups
First, the driver of the trolley:
What I find fascination is the trolley’s propeller. It looks like the propeller is really made of wires, with only the leading edge solid:
You can’t have an aerial trolley opening celebration without a band. And when you have a band, you’ve got to have a upright bass-player in the open-air cars:
How does this trolley move?
