Whitcomb was swept into this renaissance and continued the development and manufacture of all manner of mining machinery as well as other kinds of small machinery. With the completion of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869, easier quicker and cheaper methods of locating and processing coal were now in great demand. That demand drove the need for more advanced drilling and processing machinery as well as a safer method to transport the coal from the inside of the mines. Men with pickaxes and mules and wagons had long been the means of locating and moving the coal to the surface. Whitcomb recognized the need for more advanced methods and went on to invent a small battery operated locomotive that would pull coal cars safely from the mines. He also developed more precise coal drills and processing machinery that sped up as well as made safer the coal mining process.