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41 Elder, John
[br]b. 9 March 1824 Glasgow, Scotlandd. 17 September 1869 London, England[br]Scottish engineer who introduced the compound steam engine to ships and established an important shipbuilding company in Glasgow.[br]John was the third son of David Elder. The father came from a family of millwrights and moved to Glasgow where he worked for the well-known shipbuilding firm of Napier's and was involved with improving marine engines. John was educated at Glasgow High School and then for a while at the Department of Civil Engineering at Glasgow University, where he showed great aptitude for mathematics and drawing. He spent five years as an apprentice under Robert Napier followed by two short periods of activity as a pattern-maker first and then a draughtsman in England. He returned to Scotland in 1849 to become Chief Draughtsman to Napier, but in 1852 he left to become a partner with the Glasgow general engineering company of Randolph Elliott \& Co. Shortly after his induction (at the age of 28), the engineering firm was renamed Randolph Elder \& Co.; in 1868, when the partnership expired, it became known as John Elder \& Co. From the outset Elder, with his partner, Charles Randolph, approached mechanical (especially heat) engineering in a rigorous manner. Their knowledge and understanding of entropy ensured that engine design was not a hit-and-miss affair, but one governed by recognition of the importance of the new kinetic theory of heat and with it a proper understanding of thermodynamic principles, and by systematic development. In this Elder was joined by W.J.M. Rankine, Professor of Civil Engineering and Mechanics at Glasgow University, who helped him develop the compound marine engine. Elder and Randolph built up a series of patents, which guaranteed their company's commercial success and enabled them for a while to be the sole suppliers of compound steam reciprocating machinery. Their first such engine at sea was fitted in 1854 on the SS Brandon for the Limerick Steamship Company; the ship showed an improved performance by using a third less coal, which he was able to reduce still further on later designs.Elder developed steam jacketing and recognized that, with higher pressures, triple-expansion types would be even more economical. In 1862 he patented a design of quadruple-expansion engine with reheat between cylinders and advocated the importance of balancing reciprocating parts. The effect of his improvements was to greatly reduce fuel consumption so that long sea voyages became an economic reality.His yard soon reached dimensions then unequalled on the Clyde where he employed over 4,000 workers; Elder also was always interested in the social welfare of his labour force. In 1860 the engine shops were moved to the Govan Old Shipyard, and again in 1864 to the Fairfield Shipyard, about 1 mile (1.6 km) west on the south bank of the Clyde. At Fairfield, shipbuilding was commenced, and with the patents for compounding secure, much business was placed for many years by shipowners serving long-distance trades such as South America; the Pacific Steam Navigation Company took up his ideas for their ships. In later years the yard became known as the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company Ltd, but it remains today as one of Britain's most efficient shipyards and is known now as Kvaerner Govan Ltd.In 1869, at the age of only 45, John Elder was unanimously elected President of the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland; however, before taking office and giving his eagerly awaited presidential address, he died in London from liver disease. A large multitude attended his funeral and all the engineering shops were silent as his body, which had been brought back from London to Glasgow, was carried to its resting place. In 1857 Elder had married Isabella Ure, and on his death he left her a considerable fortune, which she used generously for Govan, for Glasgow and especially the University. In 1883 she endowed the world's first Chair of Naval Architecture at the University of Glasgow, an act which was reciprocated in 1901 when the University awarded her an LLD on the occasion of its 450th anniversary.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsPresident, Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland 1869.Further ReadingObituary, 1869, Engineer 28.1889, The Dictionary of National Biography, London: Smith Elder \& Co. W.J.Macquorn Rankine, 1871, "Sketch of the life of John Elder" Transactions of theInstitution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland.Maclehose, 1886, Memoirs and Portraits of a Hundred Glasgow Men.The Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Works, 1909, London: Offices of Engineering.P.M.Walker, 1984, Song of the Clyde, A History of Clyde Shipbuilding, Cambridge: PSL.R.L.Hills, 1989, Power from Steam. A History of the Stationary Steam Engine, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (covers Elder's contribution to the development of steam engines).RLH / FMW -
42 Hansom, Joseph Aloysius
SUBJECT AREA: Land transport[br]b. 26 October 1803 York, Englandd. 29 June 1883 Fulham, London, England[br]English architect and inventor, originator of the Hansom cab.[br]In 1816 he was apprenticed to his father, who was a joiner. After a year his abilities in design and construction were so marked that it was decided that he would have more scope as an architect. He was accordingly apprenticed to a Mr Phillips in York, becoming a clerk to Phillips in 1820. While he served his time he also worked on his own account and taught at a night school. In 1825 he married Hannah Glover and settled in Halifax, where he became Assistant to another architect. In 1828 he became a partner of Edward Welch, with whom he built a number of churches in the north of England. He designed the Town Hall for Birmingham and was responsible for the constructional work until 1833, but he had to become bond because the builders caused him to become bankrupt. He was appointed Manager of the business affairs of Dempster Hemming of Caldicote Hall, which included the landed estates, banking and coal-mining. It was during this period that he designed the "Patent Safety Cab" named after him and popular in Victorian days. The safety element consisted in lowering the centre of gravity by the use of the cranked axle. Hansom sold his rights for £10,000 to a company proposing to exploit the patent, but he was never paid, for the company got into difficulties; Hansom became its temporary Manager in 1839 and put matters right, for which he was paid £300, all he ever made out of the Hansom Cab. In 1842 he brought out the first issue of The Builder, but lack of capital caused him to retire from the journal. He devoted himself from then on to domestic and ecclesiastical architecture, designing many churches, colleges, convents and schools all over Britain and even in Australia and South America. Of note is St Walburga's church, Preston, Lancashire, whose spire is 306 ft (93 m) high. At various times he was in partnership with his younger brother, his eldest son, and with E.W.Pugin with whom he had a disagreement. He was a Catholic and much of his work was for the Catholic Church.[br]Further Reading1882, The Builder (8 July).1882, Illustrated London News (15 July).IMcNBiographical history of technology > Hansom, Joseph Aloysius
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43 Hoover, William Henry
SUBJECT AREA: Domestic appliances and interiors[br]b. 1849 New Berlin (now North Canton), Ohio, USAd. 25 February 1932 North Canton, Ohio, USA[br]American founder of the Electric Suction Company, which manufactured and successfully marketed the first practical and portable suction vacuum cleaner.[br]Hoover was descended from a Swiss farming family called Hofer who emigrated from Basle and settled in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, in the early eighteenth century. By 1832 the family had become tanners and lived near North Berlin in Ohio. In 1870 William Henry Hoover, who had studied at Mount Union College, bought the tannery with his brothers and soon expanded the business to make horse collars and saddlery. The firm expanded to become W.H.Hoover \& Co. In the early years of the first decade of the twentieth century, horses were beginning to be replaced by the internal combustion engine, so Hoover needed a new direction for his firm. This he found in the suction vacuum cleaner devised in 1907 by J.Murray Spangler, a cousin of Hoover's wife. The first successful cleaner of this type had been operating in England since 1901 (see Booth), but was not a portable model. Attracted by the development of the small electric motor, Spangler produced a vertical cleaner with such a motor that sucked the dust through the machine and blew it into a bag attached to the handle. Spangler applied for a patent for his invention on 14 September in the same year; it was granted for a carpet sweeper and cleaner on 2 June 1908, but Spangler was unable to market it himself and sold the rights to Hoover. The Model O machine, which ran on small wheels, was immediately manufactured and marketed. Hoover's model was the first electric, one-person-operated, domestic vacuum cleaner and was instantly successful, although the main expansion of the business was delayed for some time until the greater proportion of houses were wired for electricity. The Hoover slogan, "it beats as it sweeps as it cleans", came to be true in 1926 with the introduction of the Model 700, which was the first cleaner to offer triple-action cleaning, a process which beat, swept and sucked at the carpet. Further advances in the 1930s included the use of magnesium and the early plastics.[br]Further ReadingG.Adamson, 1969, Machines at Home, Lutterworth Press.How it Works: The Universal Encyclopaedia of Machines, Paladin. D.Yarwood, 1981, The British Kitchen, Batsford, Ch. 6.DY -
44 Ross, Andrew
SUBJECT AREA: Photography, film and optics[br]b. 1798 London, England d. 1859[br]English optical-instrument maker, founder of a photographic-lens making dynasty.[br]Apprenticed to the optical-instrument maker Gilbert at the age of 14, Ross rose to become Manager of the factory before leaving to found his own business in 1830. He soon earned a reputation for fine craftsmanship and was the first optician in England to produce achromatic microscope objectives. He had an early involvement with photography, perhaps before the public announcements in 1839, for he supplied lenses and instruments to Talbot. On hearing of Petzval's portrait lens, he made a highaperture portrait lens to his own design for the first professional calotypist, Henry Collan. It was unsuccessful, however, and Ross did little more photographic work of note, although his son Thomas and his son-in-law and one-time apprentice, John Henry Dallmeyer, made significant contributions to English photographic optics. Both Thomas and Dallmeyer were left large sums of money on Andrew's death, and independently they established successful businesses; they were to become the two most important suppliers of photographic lenses in England.[br]Further ReadingRudolf Kingslake, 1989, A History of the Photographic Lens, Boston (a brief biography of Ross).J.M.Eder, 1945, History of Photography, trans. E.Epstean, New York.H.J.P.Arnold, 1977, William Henry Fox Talbot, London.JW -
45 Sopwith, Sir Thomas (Tommy) Octave Murdoch
SUBJECT AREA: Aerospace[br]b. 18 January 1888 London, Englandd. 27 January 1989 Stockbridge, Hampshire, England[br]English aeronautical engineer and industrialist.[br]Son of a successful mining engineer, Sopwith did not shine at school and, having been turned down by the Royal Navy as a result, attended an engineering college. His first interest was motor cars and, while still in his teens, he set up a business in London with a friend in order to sell them; he also took part in races and rallies.Sopwith's interest in aviation came initially through ballooning, and in 1906 he purchased his own balloon. Four years later, inspired by the recent flights across the Channel to France and after a joy-ride at Brooklands, he bought an Avis monoplane, followed by a larger biplane, and taught himself to fly. He was awarded the Royal Aero Society's Aviator Certificate No. 31 on 21 November 1910, and he quickly distinguished himself in flying competitions on both sides of the Atlantic and started his own flying school. In his races he was ably supported by his friend Fred Sigrist, a former motor engineer. Among the people Sopwith taught to fly were an Australian, Harry Hawker, and Major Hugh Trenchard, who later became the "father" of the RAF.In 1912, depressed by the poor quality of the aircraft on trial for the British Army, Sopwith, in conjunction with Hawker and Sigrist, bought a skating rink in Kingston-upon-Thames and, assisted by Fred Sigrist, started to design and build his first aircraft, the Sopwith Hybrid. He sold this to the Royal Navy in 1913, and the following year his aviation manufacturing company became the Sopwith Aviation Company Ltd. That year a seaplane version of his Sopwith Tabloid won the Schneider Trophy in the second running of this speed competition. During 1914–18, Sopwith concentrated on producing fighters (or "scouts" as they were then called), with the Pup, the Camel, the 1½ Strutter, the Snipe and the Sopwith Triplane proving among the best in the war. He also pioneered several ideas to make flying easier for the pilot, and in 1915 he patented his adjustable tailplane and his 1 ½ Strutter was the first aircraft to be fitted with air brakes. During the four years of the First World War, Sopwith Aviation designed thirty-two different aircraft types and produced over 16,000 aircraft.The end of the First World War brought recession to the aircraft industry and in 1920 Sopwith, like many others, put his company into receivership; none the less, he immediately launched a new, smaller company with Hawker, Sigrist and V.W.Eyre, which they called the H.G. Hawker Engineering Company Ltd to avoid any confusion with the former company. He began by producing cars and motor cycles under licence, but was determined to resume aircraft production. He suffered an early blow with the death of Hawker in an air crash in 1921, but soon began supplying aircraft to the Royal Air Force again. In this he was much helped by taking on a new designer, Sydney Camm, in 1923, and during the next decade they produced a number of military aircraft types, of which the Hart light bomber and the Fury fighter, the first to exceed 200 mph (322 km/h), were the best known. In the mid-1930s Sopwith began to build a large aviation empire, acquiring first the Gloster Aircraft Company and then, in quick succession, Armstrong-Whitworth, Armstrong-Siddeley Motors Ltd and its aero-engine counterpart, and A.V.Roe, which produced Avro aircraft. Under the umbrella of the Hawker Siddeley Aircraft Company (set up in 1935) these companies produced a series of outstanding aircraft, ranging from the Hawker Hurricane, through the Avro Lancaster to the Gloster Meteor, Britain's first in-service jet aircraft, and the Hawker Typhoon, Tempest and Hunter. When Sopwith retired as Chairman of the Hawker Siddeley Group in 1963 at the age of 75, a prototype jump-jet (the P-1127) was being tested, later to become the Harrier, a for cry from the fragile biplanes of 1910.Sopwith also had a passion for yachting and came close to wresting the America's Cup from the USA in 1934 when sailing his yacht Endeavour, which incorporated a number of features years ahead of their time; his greatest regret was that he failed in his attempts to win this famous yachting trophy for Britain. After his retirement as Chairman of the Hawker Siddeley Group, he remained on the Board until 1978. The British aviation industry had been nationalized in April 1977, and Hawker Siddeley's aircraft interests merged with the British Aircraft Corporation to become British Aerospace (BAe). Nevertheless, by then the Group had built up a wide range of companies in the field of mechanical and electrical engineering, and its board conferred on Sopwith the title Founder and Life President.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsKnighted 1953. CBE 1918.Bibliography1961, "My first ten years in aviation", Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society (April) (a very informative and amusing paper).Further ReadingA.Bramson, 1990, Pure Luck: The Authorized Biography of Sir Thomas Sopwith, 1888– 1989, Wellingborough: Patrick Stephens.B.Robertson, 1970, Sopwith. The Man and His Aircraft, London (a detailed publication giving plans of all the Sopwith aircraft).CM / JDSBiographical history of technology > Sopwith, Sir Thomas (Tommy) Octave Murdoch
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46 Bevan, Edward John
[br]b. 11 December 1856 Birkenhead, Englandd. 17 October 1921 London, England[br]English co-inventor of the " viscose rayon " process for making artificial silk.[br]Bevan began his working life as a chemist in a soap works at Runcorn, but later studied chemistry at Owens College, Manchester. It was there that he met and formed a friendship with C.F. Cross, with whom he started to work on cellulose. Bevan moved to a paper mill in Scotland but then went south to London, where he and Cross set up a partnership in 1885 as consulting and analytical chemists. Their work was mainly concerned with the industrial utilization of cellulose, and with the problems of the paper and jute industries. Their joint publication, A Text-book of Paper-making, which first appeared in 1888 and went into several editions, became the standard reference and textbook on the subject. The book has a long introductory chapter on cellulose.In 1892 Cross, Bevan and Clayton Beadle discovered viscose, or sodium cellulose xanthate, and took out the patent which was to be the foundation of the "viscose rayon" industry. They had their own laboratory at Station Avenue, Kew Gardens, where they carried out much work that eventually resulted in viscose: cellulose, usually in the form of wood pulp, was treated first with caustic soda and then with carbon disulphide to form the xanthate, which was then dissolved in a solution of dilute caustic soda to produce a viscous liquid. After being aged, the viscose was extruded through fine holes in a spinneret and coagulated in a dilute acid to regenerate the cellulose as spinnable fibres. At first there was no suggestion of spinning it into fibre, but the hope was to use it for filaments in incandescent electric light bulbs. The sheen on the fibres suggested their possible use in textiles and the term "artificial silk" was later introduced. Cross and Bevan also discovered the acetate "Celanese", which was cellulose triacetate dissolved in acetone and spun in air, but both inventions needed much development before they could be produced commercially.In 1892 Bevan turned from cellulose to food and drugs and left the partnership to become Public Analyst to Middlesex County Council, a post he held until his death, although in 1895 he and Cross published their important work Cellulose. He was prominent in the affairs of the Society of Public Analysts and became one of its officials.[br]Bibliography1888, with C.F.Cross, A Text-book of Papermaking.1892, with C.F.Cross and C.Beadle, British patent no. 8,700 (viscose). 1895, with C.F.Cross, Cellulose.Further ReadingObituary, 1921, Journal of the Chemical Society.Obituary, 1921, Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry.Edwin J.Beer, 1962–3, "The birth of viscose rayon", Transactions of the Newcomen Society 35 (an account of the problems of developing viscose rayon; Beer worked under Cross in the Kew laboratories).RLH -
47 Bothe, Walter Wilhelm Georg Franz
SUBJECT AREA: Weapons and armour[br]b. 8 January 1891 Oranienburg, Berlin, Germanyd. 8 February 1957 Heidelberg, Germany[br]German nuclear scientist.[br]Bothe studied under Max Planck at the University of Berlin, gaining his doctorate in 1914. After military service during the First World War, he resumed his investigations into nuclear physics and achieved a breakthrough in 1929 when he developed a method of studying cosmic radiation by placing one Geiger counter on top of another. From this he evolved the means of high-speed counting known as "coincidence counting". The following year, in conjunction with Hans Becker, Bothe made a Further stride forward when they identified a very penetrative neutral particle by bombarding beryllium with alpha particles; this was a significant advance towards creating nuclear energy in that the neutral particle was what Chadwick later identified as the neutron.In 1934 Bothe's achievements were recognized by his appointment as Director of the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research, although this was after Planck himself had been deposed because of his Jewish sympathies. Bothe did, however, become primarily involved in Germany's pursuit of the atomic bomb and in 1944 constructed Germany's first cyclotron for accelerating nuclear particles. By that time Germany was faced with military defeat and Bothe was not able to develop his ideas further. Even so, for his work in the field of cosmic radiation Bothe shared the 1954 Nobel Prize for Physics with the naturalized Briton (formerly German) Max Born, whose subject was statistical mechanics.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsCo-winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics 1954.CMBiographical history of technology > Bothe, Walter Wilhelm Georg Franz
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48 Douglas, Donald Wills
SUBJECT AREA: Aerospace[br]b. 6 April 1892 Brooklyn, New York, USAd. 1 February 1981 Palm Springs, California, USA[br]American aircraft designer best known for bis outstanding airliner', the DC-3.[br]In 1912 Donald Douglas went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to study aeronautical engineering. After graduating in this relatively new subject he joined the Glenn L.Martin Company as Chief Engineer. In 1920 he founded the Davis-Douglas Company in California to build an aircraft capable of flying across America non-stop: unfortunately, the Cloudster failed to achieve its target. Douglas reorganized the company in 1921 as the Douglas Company (later it became the Douglas Aircraft Company). In 1924 a team of US Army personnel made the first round-the-world flight in specially designed Douglas World Cruisers, a feat which boosted Douglas's reputation considerably. This reputation was further enhanced by his airliner, designed in 1935, that revolutionized air travel: the Douglas Commercial 3, or DC-3, of which some 13,000 were built. A series of piston-engined airliners followed, culminating in the DC-7. Meanwhile, in the military field, Douglas aircraft played a major part in the Second World War. In the jet age Douglas continued to produce a wide range of successful civil and military aircraft, and the company also moved into the rocket and guided missile business. In 1966 Donald W. Douglas was still Chairman of the company, with Donald W.Douglas Jr as President. In 1967 the company merged with the McDonnell Aircraft Company to become the giant McDonnell Douglas Corporation.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsAmerican Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; Daniel Guggenheim Medal 1939.Bibliography1935, "The development and reliability of the modern multi-engined airliner", Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society, London (lecture).Further ReadingB.Yenne, 1985, McDonnell Douglas: A Tale of Two Giants, London (pays some attention to both Douglas and McDonnell, but also covers the history of the companies and the aircraft they produced).René J.Francillon, 1979, McDonnell Douglas Aircraft since 1920, London; 1988, 2nd edn (a comprehensive history of the company's aircraft).JDS -
49 Gabor, Dennis (Dénes)
SUBJECT AREA: Photography, film and optics[br]b. 5 June 1900 Budapest, Hungaryd. 9 February 1979 London, England[br]Hungarian (naturalized British) physicist, inventor of holography.[br]Gabor became interested in physics at an early age. Called up for military service in 1918, he was soon released when the First World War came to an end. He then began a mechanical engineering course at the Budapest Technical University, but a further order to register for military service prompted him to flee in 1920 to Germany, where he completed his studies at Berlin Technical University. He was awarded a Diploma in Engineering in 1924 and a Doctorate in Electrical Engineering in 1927. He then went on to work in the physics laboratory of Siemens \& Halske. He returned to Hungary in 1933 and developed a new kind of fluorescent lamp called the plasma lamp. Failing to find a market for this device, Gabor made the decision to abandon his homeland and emigrate to England. There he joined British Thompson-Houston (BTH) in 1934 and married a colleague from the company in 1936. Gabor was also unsuccessful in his attempts to develop the plasma lamp in England, and by 1937 he had begun to work in the field of electron optics. His work was interrupted by the outbreak of war in 1939, although as he was not yet a British subject he was barred from making any significant contribution to the British war effort. It was only when the war was near its end that he was able to return to electron optics and begin the work that led to the invention of holography. The theory was developed during 1947 and 1948; Gabor went on to demonstrate that the theories worked, although it was not until the invention of the laser in 1960 that the full potential of his invention could be appreciated. He coined the term "hologram" from the Greek holos, meaning complete, and gram, meaning written. The three-dimensional images have since found many applications in various fields, including map making, medical imaging, computing, information technology, art and advertising. Gabor left BTH to become an associate professor at the Imperial College of Science and Technology in 1949, a position he held until his retirement in 1967. In 1971 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for his work on holography.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsRoyal Society Rumford Medal 1968. Franklin Institute Michelson Medal 1968. CBE 1970. Nobel Prize for Physics 1971.Bibliography1948. "A new microscopic principle", Nature 161:777 (Gabor's earliest publication on holography).1949. "Microscopy by reconstructed wavefronts", Proceedings of the Royal Society A197: 454–87.1951, "Microscopy by reconstructed wavefronts II", Proc. Phys. Soc. B, 64:449–69. 1966, "Holography or the “Whole Picture”", New Scientist 29:74–8 (an interesting account written after laser beams were used to produce optical holograms).Further ReadingT.E.Allibone, 1980, contribution to Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 26: 107–47 (a full account of Gabor's life and work).JW -
50 Herreshoff, Nathaniel Greene
SUBJECT AREA: Ports and shipping[br]b. 18 March 1848 Bristol, Rhode Island, USAd. 2 June 1938 Bristol, Rhode Island, USA[br]American naval architect and designer of six successful America's Cup defenders.[br]Herreshoff, or, as he was known, Captain Nat, was seventh in a family of nine, four of whom became blind in childhood. Association with such problems may have sharpened his appreciation of shape and form; indeed, he made a lengthy European small-boat trip with a blind brother. While working on yacht designs, he used three-dimensional models in conjunction with the sheer draught on the drawing-board. With many of the family being boatbuilders, he started designing at the age of 16 and then decided to make this his career. As naval architecture was not then a graduating subject, he studied mechanical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While still studying, c.1867, he broke new ground by preparing direct reading time handicapping tables for yachts up to 110 ft (33.5 m) long. After working with the Corliss Company, he set up the Herreshoff Manufacturing Company, in partnership with J.B.Herreshoff, as shipbuilders and engineers. Over the years their output included steam machinery, fishing vessels, pleasure craft and racing yachts. They built the first torpedo boat for the US Navy and another for the Royal Navy, the only such acquisition in the late nineteenth century. Herreshoff designed six of the world's greatest yachts, of the America's Cup, between 1890 and 1920. His accomplishments included new types of lightweight wood fasteners, new systems of framing, hollow spars and better methods of cutting sails. He continued to work full-time until 1935 and his work was internationally acclaimed. He maintained cordial relations with his British rivals Fife, Nicholson and G.L. Watson, and enjoyed friendship with his compatriot Edward Burgess. Few will ever match Herreshoff as an all-round engineer and designer.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsHerreshoff was one of the very few, other than heads of state, to become an Honorary Member of the New York Yacht Club.Further ReadingL.F.Herreshoff, 1953, Capt. Nat Herreshoff. The Wizard of Bristol, White Plains, NY: Sheridan House; 2nd edn 1981.FMWBiographical history of technology > Herreshoff, Nathaniel Greene
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51 Issigonis, Sir Alexander Arnold Constantine (Alec)
[br]b. 18 November 1906 Smyrna (now Izmir), Turkeyd. 2 October 1988 Birmingham, England[br]British automobile designer whose work included the Morris Minor and the Mini series.[br]His father was of Greek descent but was a naturalized British subject in Turkey who ran a marine engineering business. After the First World War, the British in Turkey were evacuated by the Royal Navy, the Issigonis family among them. His father died en route in Malta, but the rest of the family arrived in England in 1922. Alec studied engineering at Battersea Polytechnic for three years and in 1928 was employed as a draughtsman by a firm of consulting engineers in Victoria Street who were working on a form of automatic transmission. He had occasion to travel frequently in the Midlands at this time and visited many factories in the automobile industry. He was offered a job in the drawing office at Humber and lived for a couple of years in Kenilworth. While there he met Robert Boyle, Chief Engineer of Morris Motors (see Morris, William Richard), who offered him a job at Cowley. There he worked at first on the design of independent front suspension. At Morris Motors, he designed the Morris Minor, which entered production in 1948 and continued to be manufactured until 1971. Issigonis disliked mergers, and after the merger of Morris with Austin to form the British Motor Corporation (BMC) he left to join Alvis in 1952. The car he designed there, a V8 saloon, was built as a prototype but was never put into production. Following his return to BMC to become Technical Director in 1955, his most celebrated design was the Mini series, which entered production in 1959. This was a radically new concept: it was unique for its combination of a transversely mounted engine in unit with the gearbox, front wheel drive and rubber suspension system. This suspension system, designed in cooperation with Alex Moulton, was also a fundamental innovation, developed from the system designed by Moulton for the earlier Alvis prototype. Issigonis remained as Technical Director of BMC until his retirement.[br]Further ReadingPeter King, 1989, The Motor Men. Pioneers of the British Motor Industry, London: Quiller Press.IMcNBiographical history of technology > Issigonis, Sir Alexander Arnold Constantine (Alec)
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52 Kapp, Gisbert Johann Eduard Karl
SUBJECT AREA: Electricity[br]b. 2 September 1852 Mauer, Vienna, Austriad. 10 August 1922 Birmingham, England[br]Austrian (naturalized British in 1881) engineer and a pioneer of dynamo design, being particularly associated with the concept of the magnetic circuit.[br]Kapp entered the Polytechnic School in Zurich in 1869 and gained a mechanical engineering diploma. He became a member of the engineering staff at the Vienna International Exhibition of 1873, and then spent some time in the Austrian navy before entering the service of Gwynne \& Co. of London, where he designed centrifugal pumps and gas exhausters. Kapp resolved to become an electrical engineer after a visit to the Paris Electrical Exhibition of 1881 and in the following year was appointed Manager of the Crompton Co. works at Chelmsford. There he developed and patented the dynamo with compound field winding. Also at that time, with Crompton, he patented electrical measuring instruments with over-saturated electromagnets. He became a naturalized British subject in 1881.In 1886 Kapp's most influential paper was published. This described his concept of the magnetic circuit, providing for the first time a sound theoretical basis for dynamo design. The theory was also developed independently by J. Hopkinson. After commencing practice as a consulting engineer in 1884 he carried out design work on dynamos and also electricity-supply and -traction schemes in Germany, Italy, Norway, Russia and Switzerland. From 1891 to 1894 much of his time was spent designing a new generating station in Bristol, officially as Assistant to W.H. Preece. There followed an appointment in Germany as General Secretary of the Verband Deutscher Electrotechniker. For some years he edited the Electrotechnische Zeitschrift and was also a part-time lecturer at the Charlottenberg Technical High School in Berlin. In 1904 Kapp was invited to accept the new Chair of Electrical Engineering at the University of Birmingham, which he occupied until 1919. He was the author of several books on electrical machine and transformer design.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsInstitution of Civil Engineers Telford Medal 1886 and 1888. President, Institution of Electrical Engineers 1909.Bibliography10 October 1882, with R.E.B.Crompton, British patent no. 4,810; (the compound wound dynamo).1886, "Modern continuous current dynamo electric machines and their engines", Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers 83: 123–54.Further ReadingD.G.Tucker, 1989, "A new archive of Gisbert Kapp papers", Proceedings of the Meeting on History of Electrical Engineering, IEE 4/1–4/11 (a transcript of an autobiography for his family).D.G.Tucker, 1973, Gisbert Kapp 1852–1922, Birmingham: Birmingham University (includes a bibliography of his most important publications).GWBiographical history of technology > Kapp, Gisbert Johann Eduard Karl
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53 Kompfner, Rudolph
[br]b. 16 May 1909 Vienna, Austriad. 3 December 1977 Stanford, California, USA[br]Austrian (naturalized English in 1949, American in 1957) electrical engineer primarily known for his invention of the travelling-wave tube.[br]Kompfner obtained a degree in engineering from the Vienna Technische Hochschule in 1931 and qualified as a Diplom-Ingenieur in Architecture two years later. The following year, with a worsening political situation in Austria, he moved to England and became an architectural apprentice. In 1936 he became Managing Director of a building firm owned by a relative, but at the same time he was avidly studying physics and electronics. His first patent, for a television pick-up device, was filed in 1935 and granted in 1937, but was not in fact taken up. In June 1940 he was interned on the Isle of Man, but as a result of a paper previously sent by him to the Editor of Wireless Engineer he was released the following December and sent to join the group at Birmingham University working on centimetric radar. There he worked on klystrons, with little success, but as a result of the experience gained he eventually invented the travelling-wave tube (TWT), which was based on a helical transmission line. After disbandment of the Birmingham team, in 1946 Kompfner moved to the Clarendon Laboratory at Oxford and in 1947 he became a British subject. At the Clarendon Laboratory he met J.R. Pierce of Bell Laboratories, who worked out the theory of operation of the TWT. After gaining his DPhil at Oxford in 1951, Kompfner accepted a post as Principal Scientific Officer at Signals Electronic Research Laboratories, Baldock, but very soon after that he was invited by Pierce to work at Bell on microwave tubes. There, in 1952, he invented the backward-wave oscillator (BWO). He was appointed Director of Electronics Research in 1955 and Director of Communications Research in 1962, having become a US citizen in 1957. In 1958, with Pierce, he designed Echo 1, the first (passive) satellite, which was launched in August 1960. He was also involved with the development of Telstar, the first active communications satellite, which was launched in 1962. Following his retirement from Bell in 1973, he continued to pursue research, alternately at Stanford, California, and Oxford, England.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsPhysical Society Duddell Medal 1955. Franklin Institute Stuart Ballantine Medal 1960. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers David Sarnoff Award 1960. Member of the National Academy of Engineering 1966. Member of the National Academy of Science 1968. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Medal of Honour 1973. City of Philadelphia John Scott Award 1974. Roentgen Society Silvanus Thompson Medal 1974. President's National medal of Science 1974. Honorary doctorates Vienna 1965, Oxford 1969.Bibliography1944, "Velocity modulated beams", Wireless Engineer 17:262.1942, "Transit time phenomena in electronic tubes", Wireless Engineer 19:3. 1942, "Velocity modulating grids", Wireless Engineer 19:158.1946, "The travelling-wave tube", Wireless Engineer 42:369.1964, The Invention of the TWT, San Francisco: San Francisco Press.Further ReadingJ.R.Pierce, 1992, "History of the microwave tube art", Proceedings of the Institute of Radio Engineers: 980.KF -
54 Rateau, Auguste Camille-Edmond
[br]b. 13 October 1863 Royan, Franced. 13 January 1930 Neuilly-sur-Seine, France[br]French constructor of turbines, inventor of the turbo compressor and a centrifugal fan for mine ventilation.[br]A don of the Ecole Polytechnique and the Ecole Supérieure des Mines in Paris, Rateau joined the French Corps des Mines in 1887. Between 1888 and 1898 he taught applied mechanics and electro technics at the Ecole des Mines in St-Etienne. Trying to apply the results of his research to practise, he became into contact with commercial firms, before he was appointed Professor of Industrial Electricity at the Ecole Supérieure des Mines in Paris in 1902. He held this position until 1910, although he founded the Société Anonyme Rateau in Paris in 1903 which by the time of his death had subsidiaries in most of the industrial centres of Europe. By the middle of the nineteenth century, when the increasing problems of ventilation in coal mines had become evident and in many countries had led to several unsatisfactory mechanical constructions, Rateau concentrated on this problem soon after he began working in St-Etienne. The result of his research was the design of a centrifugal fan in 1887 with which he established the principles of mechanical ventilation on a general basis that led to future developments and helped, together with the ventilator invented by Capell in England, to pave the way for the use of electricity in mine ventilation.Rateau continued the study of fluid mechanics and the applications of rotating engines, and after he had published widely on this subject he began to construct many steam turbines, centrifugal compressors and centrifugal pumps. The multicellular Rateau turbine of 1901 became the prototype for many others constructors. During the First World War, when he was very active in the French armaments industry, he developed the invention of the automatic supercharger for aircraft engines and later diesel engines.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsAcadémie des Sciences, Prix Fourneyron 1899, Prix Poncelet 1911, Member 1918.Bibliography1892, Considérations sur les turbo-machines et en particulier sur les ventilateurs, St- Etienne.1900, Traité des turbo-machines, Paris.1907, Ventilateurs centrifuges à haute pression, Paris.1908. Développement des turbines à vapeur d'échappement, Paris. 1917, Notice sur les travaux scientifiques et techniques, Paris.Further ReadingH.H.Suplee, 1930, obituary, Mechanical Engineering 52:570–1.L.Leprince-Ringuet (ed.), 1951, Les inventeurs célèbres, Geneva: 151–2 (a comprehensive description of his life and the importance of his turbines).WKBiographical history of technology > Rateau, Auguste Camille-Edmond
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55 Swan, Sir Joseph Wilson
[br]b. 31 October 1828 Sunderland, Englandd. 27 May 1914 Warlingham, Surrey, England[br]English chemist, inventor in Britain of the incandescent electric lamp and of photographic processes.[br]At the age of 14 Swan was apprenticed to a Sunderland firm of druggists, later joining John Mawson who had opened a pharmacy in Newcastle. While in Sunderland Swan attended lectures at the Athenaeum, at one of which W.E. Staite exhibited electric-arc and incandescent lighting. The impression made on Swan prompted him to conduct experiments that led to his demonstration of a practical working lamp in 1879. As early as 1848 he was experimenting with carbon as a lamp filament, and by 1869 he had mounted a strip of carbon in a vessel exhausted of air as completely as was then possible; however, because of residual air, the filament quickly failed.Discouraged by the cost of current from primary batteries and the difficulty of achieving a good vacuum, Swan began to devote much of his attention to photography. With Mawson's support the pharmacy was expanded to include a photographic business. Swan's interest in making permanent photographic records led him to patent the carbon process in 1864 and he discovered how to make a sensitive dry plate in place of the inconvenient wet collodian process hitherto in use. He followed this success with the invention of bromide paper, the subject of a British patent in 1879.Swan resumed his interest in electric lighting. Sprengel's invention of the mercury pump in 1865 provided Swan with the means of obtaining the high vacuum he needed to produce a satisfactory lamp. Swan adopted a technique which was to become an essential feature in vacuum physics: continuing to heat the filament during the exhaustion process allowed the removal of absorbed gases. The inventions of Gramme, Siemens and Brush provided the source of electrical power at reasonable cost needed to make the incandescent lamp of practical service. Swan exhibited his lamp at a meeting in December 1878 of the Newcastle Chemical Society and again the following year before an audience of 700 at the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical Society. Swan's failure to patent his invention immediately was a tactical error as in November 1879 Edison was granted a British patent for his original lamp, which, however, did not go into production. Parchmentized thread was used in Swan's first commercial lamps, a material soon superseded by the regenerated cellulose filament that he developed. The cellulose filament was made by extruding a solution of nitro-cellulose in acetic acid through a die under pressure into a coagulating fluid, and was used until the ultimate obsolescence of the carbon-filament lamp. Regenerated cellulose became the first synthetic fibre, the further development and exploitation of which he left to others, the patent rights for the process being sold to Courtaulds.Swan also devised a modification of Planté's secondary battery in which the active material was compressed into a cellular lead plate. This has remained the central principle of all improvements in secondary cells, greatly increasing the storage capacity for a given weight.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsKnighted 1904. FRS 1894. President, Institution of Electrical Engineers 1898. First President, Faraday Society 1904. Royal Society Hughes Medal 1904. Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur 1881.Bibliography2 January 1880, British patent no. 18 (incandescent electric lamp).24 May 1881, British patent no. 2,272 (improved plates for the Planté cell).1898, "The rise and progress of the electrochemical industries", Journal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers 27:8–33 (Swan's Presidential Address to the Institution of Electrical Engineers).Further ReadingM.E.Swan and K.R.Swan, 1968, Sir Joseph Wilson Swan F.R.S., Newcastle upon Tyne (a detailed account).R.C.Chirnside, 1979, "Sir Joseph Swan and the invention of the electric lamp", IEEElectronics and Power 25:96–100 (a short, authoritative biography).GWBiographical history of technology > Swan, Sir Joseph Wilson
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56 Taylor, John
SUBJECT AREA: Medical technology[br]b. 16 August 1703 Norwich, Englandd. 17 September 1772 Prague, Bohemia[br]English oculist and exponent of surgical treatment of squint and cataract.[br]In 1722, employed as an apothecary's assistant, he studied surgery and especially diseases of the eye under Cheselden at St Thomas's Hospital, London. He returned to Norwich to practise, but in 1727 he assumed the role of itinerant surgeon oculist, with a particular reputation for putting eyes straight; at first he covered the major part of the British Isles and then he extended his activities to Europe.He obtained MDs from Basle in 1733, and from Liège and Cologne in 1734. In 1736 he was appointed Oculist to George II. It is likely that he was responsible for Johann Sebastian Bach's blindness, and Gibbon was one of his patients. The subject of considerable obloquy on account of his self-advertisement in the crudest and most bombastic terms, it is none the less certain that he had developed a technique, probably related to couching, which was considerably in advance of that of other practitioners and at least offered a prospect of assistance where none had been available.Dr Johnson declared him "an instance of how far impudence will carry ignorance". Without justification, he styled himself "Chevalier". He is said, not improbably having regard to his age, to have become blind himself later in life. His son carried on his practice.[br]Bibliography1727, An Account of the Mechanism of the Eye, Norwich.1736, Treatise on the Chrystalline Humour of the Human Eye, London. 1739, De vera causi strabismi, Lisbon.Further Reading1761, The History of the Travels and Adventures of the Chevalier John Taylor, Ophthalmiater, London.MG -
57 təbəə
subjecttəbəəlik – citizenshiptəbəəliyi qəbul etmək – take out citizenship; become a citizen -
58 Abney, William de Wiveleslie
SUBJECT AREA: Photography, film and optics[br]b. 24 July 1843 Englandd. 2 December 1920 England[br]English photographic scientist, inventor and author.[br]Abney began his career as an officer in the Army and was an instructor in chemistry in the Royal Engineers at Chatham, where he made substantial use of photography as a working tool. He retired from the Army in 1877 and joined the Science and Art Department at South Kensington. It was at Abney's suggestion that a collection of photographic equipment and processes was established in the South Kensington Museum (later to become the Science Museum Photography Collection).Abney undertook significant researches into the nature of gelatine silver halide emulsions at a time when they were being widely adopted by photographers. Perhaps his most important practical innovations were the introduction of hydroquinone as a developing agent in 1880 and silver gelatine citrochloride emulsions for printing-out paper (POP) in 1882. However, Abney was at the forefront of many aspects of photographic research during a period of great innovation and change in photography. He devised new techniques of photomechanical printing and conducted significant researches in the fields of photochemistry and spectral analysis. Abney published throughout his career for both the specialist scientist and the more general photographic practitioner.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsKCB 1900. FRS 1877. Served at different times as President of the Royal Astronomical, Royal Photographic and Physical Societies. Chairman, Royal Society of Arts.Further ReadingObituary, 1921, Proceedings of the Royal Society (Series A) 99. J.M.Eder, 1945, History of Photography, trans. E.Epstein, New York.JWBiographical history of technology > Abney, William de Wiveleslie
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59 Adamson, Daniel
SUBJECT AREA: Mechanical, pneumatic and hydraulic engineering, Metallurgy, Steam and internal combustion engines[br]b. 1818 Shildon, Co. Durham, Englandd. January 1890 Didsbury, Manchester, England[br]English mechanical engineer, pioneer in the use of steel for boilers, which enabled higher pressures to be introduced; pioneer in the use of triple-and quadruple-expansion mill engines.[br]Adamson was apprenticed between 1835 and 1841 to Timothy Hackworth, then Locomotive Superintendent on the Stockton \& Darlington Railway. After this he was appointed Draughtsman, then Superintendent Engineer, at that railway's locomotive works until in 1847 he became Manager of Shildon Works. In 1850 he resigned and moved to act as General Manager of Heaton Foundry, Stockport. In the following year he commenced business on his own at Newton Moor Iron Works near Manchester, where he built up his business as an iron-founder and boilermaker. By 1872 this works had become too small and he moved to a 4 acre (1.6 hectare) site at Hyde Junction, Dukinfield. There he employed 600 men making steel boilers, heavy machinery including mill engines fitted with the American Wheelock valve gear, hydraulic plant and general millwrighting. His success was based on his early recognition of the importance of using high-pressure steam and steel instead of wrought iron. In 1852 he patented his type of flanged seam for the firetubes of Lancashire boilers, which prevented these tubes cracking through expansion. In 1862 he patented the fabrication of boilers by drilling rivet holes instead of punching them and also by drilling the holes through two plates held together in their assembly positions. He had started to use steel for some boilers he made for railway locomotives in 1857, and in 1860, only four years after Bessemer's patent, he built six mill engine boilers from steel for Platt Bros, Oldham. He solved the problems of using this new material, and by his death had made c.2,800 steel boilers with pressures up to 250 psi (17.6 kg/cm2).He was a pioneer in the general introduction of steel and in 1863–4 was a partner in establishing the Yorkshire Iron and Steel Works at Penistone. This was the first works to depend entirely upon Bessemer steel for engineering purposes and was later sold at a large profit to Charles Cammell \& Co., Sheffield. When he started this works, he also patented improvements both to the Bessemer converters and to the engines which provided their blast. In 1870 he helped to turn Lincolnshire into an important ironmaking area by erecting the North Lincolnshire Ironworks. He was also a shareholder in ironworks in South Wales and Cumberland.He contributed to the development of the stationary steam engine, for as early as 1855 he built one to run with a pressure of 150 psi (10.5 kg/cm) that worked quite satisfactorily. He reheated the steam between the cylinders of compound engines and then in 1861–2 patented a triple-expansion engine, followed in 1873 by a quadruple-expansion one to further economize steam. In 1858 he developed improved machinery for testing tensile strength and compressive resistance of materials, and in the same year patents for hydraulic lifting jacks and riveting machines were obtained.He was a founding member of the Iron and Steel Institute and became its President in 1888 when it visited Manchester. The previous year he had been President of the Institution of Civil Engineers when he was presented with the Bessemer Gold Medal. He was a constant contributor at the meetings of these associations as well as those of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. He did not live to see the opening of one of his final achievements, the Manchester Ship Canal. He was the one man who, by his indomitable energy and skill at public speaking, roused the enthusiasm of the people in Manchester for this project and he made it a really practical proposition in the face of strong opposition.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsPresident, Institution of Civil Engineers 1887.President, Iron and Steel Institute 1888. Institution of Civil Engineers Bessemer Gold Medal 1887.Further ReadingObituary, Engineer 69:56.Obituary, Engineering 49:66–8.Obituary, Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers 100:374–8.H.W.Dickinson, 1938, A Short History of the Steam Engine, Cambridge University Press (provides an illustration of Adamson's flanged seam for boilers).R.L.Hills, 1989, Power from Steam. A History of the Stationary Steam Engine, Cambridge University Press (covers the development of the triple-expansion engine).RLH -
60 Anderson, John
SUBJECT AREA: Weapons and armour[br]b. 1726 Roseneath, Dumbartonshire, Scotlandd. 13 January 1796[br]Scottish natural philosopher.[br]Born in Roseneath manse, son of the minister, he was educated after his father's death by an aunt, a Mrs Turner, to whom he later paid back the cost, and was later an officer in the corps that was raised to resist the rebellion of 1745. He studied at Glasgow, where in 1756 he became Professor of Oriental Languages and, in 1760, Professor of Natural Philosophy; he is notable for allowing artisans to attend his lectures in their working clothes. He planned the fortifications set up to defend Greenock in 1759, and was sympathetic with the French Revolution. He invented a cannon in which the recoil was counteracted by the condensation of air in the carriage. After unsuccessfully trying to interest the Government in this gun, he went to Paris in 1791 and offered it to the National Convention. While there he invented a means of smuggling French newspapers into Germany by the use of small balloons. He lost in a lawsuit with the other professors. In 1786 he published Institutes of Physics, which ran to five editions in ten years, and in 1800 he wrote on Roman antiquities. Upon his death he left all his library and apparatus to an educational institute, which was named after him but has now become the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow.[br]Bibliography1786, Institutes of Physics.Further ReadingGlasgow Mechanics' Magazine.IMcN
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