John Bull the past Navy blue, but more recently with the Union Jack colours). Britannia, or a lion, is sometimes used as an alternative in some editorial cartoons. As a literary figure, John Bull is well-intentioned, frustrated, full of common sense, and entirely of native country stock. Unlike Uncle Sam later, he is not a figure of authority but rather a yeoman who prefers his small beer and domestic peace, possessed of neither patriarchal power nor heroic defiance. John Arbuthnot provided him with a sister named Peg (Scotland), and a traditional adversary in Louis Baboon (the House of Bourbon in France). Peg
John Bull (locomotive) locomotives, giving this engine the number 1 and officially naming it "Stevens" (after the C&A's first president, Robert L. Stevens). However, through regular use of the engine, crews began calling it "the old John Bull", a reference to the cartoon personification of England, John Bull. Eventually the informal name was shortened to "John Bull" and this name was so much more widely used that "Stevens" fell out of use. In September 1836 the "John Bull" and two coaches were shipped by canal to Harrisburg, and became the first locomotive to operate there. Stephenson built the locomotive originally as an 0-4-0.