Fact check: Old Hollywood movie scene passed off as footage of world's first train
A black and white video of a steam locomotive chugging with wagons filled with passengers is going viral on social media.
By Newsmeter Network Published on 14 Oct 2021 10:15 AM GMT
Hyderabad: A black and white video of a steam locomotive chugging with wagons filled with passengers is going viral on social media. Users claim it is the world's first train which started on December 24, 1809.
Users shared the video with a caption: "World's first train started on 24-dec-1809 (about 211 years ago). The video is worth watching".
Click here to view the post.
Similar posts can be viewed here.
Fact Check:
NewsMeter found the claim to be false.
Firstly, NewsMeter extracted keyframes from the video, and with the help of the InVid tool and reverse image search, our fact check team found the longer version of the same video which was uploaded on YouTube in 2011.
The title of the video read: "TRAIN HISTORY IN CINEMA 1 Our Hospitality Buster Keaton 1923."
Secondly, the team found a blog that claimed that this was a scene from 'Our Hospitality'. The blog claimed that the train shown in the film was a replica of Robert Stephenson's 'rocket' locomotive.
https://silentfilmlivemusic.
Additionally, we found the full movie on YouTube and noticed that several different clips from the movie have been taken out and put together to create the viral video. The viral clip is actually a series of scenes from a 1923 romantic comedy titled 'Our Hospitality.'
For more information on the film, we looked into IMDb, we found the screengrab on the website, which said the shots are from `Our Hospitality'.
https://www.imdb.com/name/
https://www.imdb.com/title/
According to Britannica, the first railway in the world to operate freight and passenger service with steam traction was Stockton & Darlington Railway which ran on September 27, 1825.
However, on February 21, 1804, the world's first steam-powered railway journey took place. It took 10 tons of iron and 70 men and it hauled nearly ten miles from Penydarren, near Merthyr Tydfil in South Wales, at a speed of five miles per hour.
https://www.historic-uk.com/
Hence, the claim is false.
