Does the statement, "We've always done it that way" ring any bells... ?

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used?

Because that's the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the U.S. Railroads. Why did the English build them like that?

Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used. Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?

Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been used ever since. And the ruts in the roads?

Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. And bureaucracies live forever.

This is the one that started my hoax page. It has been passed around as being true, but is not, as it is not the world's standard gauge, and the gauge has been different in different countries, and different centuries of the same country..

http://www.sdrm.org/faqs/gauge/ http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/RAgauge.htm

It is an urban myth this is typical of how myths begin. If they are passed around enough, people believe George Washington chopped down a Cherry Tree ( a story started after he died and made up by a newspaper columnist---just one of the myths ).