-
1 Shaw, Percy
[br]b. 1889 Yorkshire, England d. 1975[br]English inventor of the "catseye" reflecting roadstud.[br]Little is known of Shaw's youth, but in the 1930s he was running a comparatively successful business repairing roads. One evening in 1933, he was driving to his home in Halifax, West Yorkshire; it was late, dark and foggy and only the reflection of his headlights from the tram-tracks guided him and kept him on the road. He decided to find or make an alternative to tramlines, which were not universal and by that time were being taken up as trams were being replaced with diesel buses.Shaw needed a place to work and bought the old Boothtown Mansion, a cloth-merchant's house built in the mid-eighteenth century. There he devoted himself to the production of a prototype of the reflecting roadstud, inspired by the reflective nature of a cat's eyes. Shaw's design consisted of a prism backed by an aluminium mirror, set in pairs in a rubber casing; when traffic passed over the stud, the prisms would be wiped clean as the casing was depressed. In 1934, Shaw obtained permission from the county surveyor to lay, at his own expense, a short stretch of catseyes on a main highway near his home: fifty were laid at Brightlington cross-roads, an accident blackspot near Bradford. This was inspected by a number of surveyors in 1936. The first order for catseyes had already been placed in 1935, for a pedestrian crossing in Baldon, Yorkshire. There were alternative designs in existence, particularly in France, and in 1937 the Ministry of Transport laid an 8 km (5 mile) stretch in Oxfordshire with sample lengths of different types of studs. After two years, most of them had fractured, become displaced or ceased to reflect; only the product of Shaw's company, Reflecting Roadstuds Ltd, was still in perfect condition. The outbreak of the Second World War brought blackout regulations, which caused a great boost to sales of reflecting roadstuds; orders reached some 40,000 per week. Production was limited, however, due to the shortage of rubber supplies after the Japanese overran South-East Asia; until the end of the war, only about 12,000 catseyes were produced a year.Over fifty million catseyes have been installed in Britain, where on average there are about two hundred and fifty catseyes in each kilometre of road, if laid in a single line. The success of Shaw's invention brought him great wealth, although he continued to live in the same house, without curtains—which obstructed his view—or carpets—which harboured odours and germs. He had three Rolls-Royce cars, and four television sets which were permanently switched on while he was at home, each tuned to a different channel.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsOBE 1965.Further ReadingE.de Bono (ed.), 1979, Eureka, London: Thames \& Hudson."Percy's bright idea", En Route (the magazine of the Caravan Club), reprinted in The Police Review, 23 March 1983.IMcN -
2 Automotive engineering
See also: INDEX BY SUBJECT AREA[br]Austin, HerbertIssigonis, Sir Alexander Arnold ConstantineMorris, William Richard -
3 Civil engineering
-
4 Land transport
See also: INDEX BY SUBJECT AREA[br]Austin, HerbertHamilton, Harold LeeIssigonis, Sir Alexander Arnold ConstantineMa JunMorris, William RichardSauerbrun, Charles de -
5 Railways and locomotives
Biographical history of technology > Railways and locomotives
См. также в других словарях:
Percy Shaw — (1890 1 September, 1976) was an English inventor who patented the reflective road stud cat s eye .BiographyShaw was born in Halifax in West Yorkshire, the son of James Shaw, a dyehouse labourer, who worked at a local mill. When he was 13, he was… … Wikipedia
Percy Bysshe Shelley — Percy Shelley Born 4 August 1792(1792 08 04) Field Place, Horsham, England[1] … Wikipedia
Percy B. Shelley — Percy Bysshe Shelley Pour les articles homonymes, voir Shelley. Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe … Wikipédia en Français
Percy Shelley — Percy Bysshe Shelley Pour les articles homonymes, voir Shelley. Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe … Wikipédia en Français
Percy Marmont — Dans Jeune et innocent (1937) Données clés Naissance … Wikipédia en Français
Percy Colquhoun — Percy Brereton Colquhoun (28 September 1866 23 October 1936) was an Australian parliamentarian, lawyer and sportsman. cite web first=Don last=Wilkey title =Colquhoun, Percy Brereton (1866 1936) publisher =Australian National University… … Wikipedia
Shaw Festival production history — The Shaw Festival is a major Canadian theatre festival in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario, the second largest repertory theatre company in North America. Founded in 1962, its original mandate was to stimulate interest in G. Bernard Shaw and his… … Wikipedia
Percy Bysshe Shelley — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Shelley. Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe Shelley ( … Wikipédia en Français
Percy Dearmer — The Reverend Percy Dearmer MA (Oxon), DD, (February 27, 1867 ndash; May 29, 1936) was an English priest and liturgist best known as the author of The Parson s Handbook , an Anglo Catholic liturgical manual. A lifelong socialist, he was an early… … Wikipedia
Shaw, George Bernard — born July 26, 1856, Dublin, Ire. died Nov. 2, 1950, Ayot St. Lawrence, Hertfordshire, Eng. Irish playwright and critic. After moving to London in 1876, he worked for years as a music and art critic, wrote book and theatre reviews, and was an… … Universalium
George Bernard Shaw — Shaw 1925 George Bernard Shaw (* 26. Juli 1856 in Dublin, Irland; † 2. November 1950 in Ayot Saint Lawrence, England), war ein irisch britischer Dramatiker, Politiker, Satiriker, Musikkritiker und Pazifist, der 1925 den Nobelpreis für Literatur… … Deutsch Wikipedia
