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121 Johnson, Percival Norton
SUBJECT AREA: Metallurgy[br]b. 29 September 1792 London, Englandd. 1 June 1866 Stoke Fleming, Devon, England[br]English chemist, assayer, mining engineer and founder of the firm Johnson Matthey.[br]He was the son of John Johnson, then sole Commercial Assayer in London, from whom he inherited his aptitude for chemistry and metallurgy. At the age of 14 he was apprenticed to his father by the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths. Ore samples then being analysed in Johnson's office introduced him to the new metal platinum, and resulted in a paper to Philosophical Magazine in 1812. Johnson established himself as a "practical mineralogist" in Maiden Lane, London, in 1818 and in Hatton Garden after 1822. He was greatly assisted by a fellow metallurgist, Thomas Cock (1787–1842), who developed the platinum fabrication and pigment sides of die business. In 1827 Johnson was consulted by the Russian government about the exploitation of the rich platinum deposits that had been discovered in the Urals in 1819. Between 1829 and 1832 Johnson became the first in England to manufacture nickel, extracted from nickel-bearing material imported from Germany at his plant at Bow Common on the Regent's Canal. In 1832 he began to réfine gold imported from the Imperial Brazilian Association by a process which separated without loss the metals silver, platinum, palladium, rhodium and iridium. This profitable activity continued until the Brazilian company was wound up in 1852. Since 1824, Johnson had been named "assay master" by a number of mining companies. From 1843 until the mid-1850s he had a considerable mining interest in the West Country. Meanwhile, the Hatton Garden establishment continued to prosper. In 1839 he was joined by George Matthey, who particularly fostered the Russian platinum business, and in 1851 he was taken unto partnership and the firm became the celebrated Johnson Matthey. In the following year the firm was officially recognized as one of the four Assayers to the Bank of England appointed to handle the flood of gold dust then arriving in England from the Australian gold fields. Soon after, however, ill health compelled him to retire to his Devon country house.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFRS 1846.Bibliography1812, "Experiments which prove platina, when combined with gold and silver, to be soluble in nitric acid", Philosophical Magazine (1st series) 40(171):3–4.Further ReadingD.McDonald, 1951, Percival Norton Johnson, London: Johnson Matthey (includes lists of his publications and his honours and awards).——1964, The Johnsons of Morden Lane, London: Martins.——1960, A History of Platinum, London: Johnson Matthey.ASDBiographical history of technology > Johnson, Percival Norton
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122 Kegel, Karl
SUBJECT AREA: Mining and extraction technology[br]b. 19 May 1876 Magdeburg, Germanyd. 5 March 1959 Freiberg, Saxony, Germany[br]German professor of mining who established the mining of lignite as a discipline in the science of mining.[br]Within the long tradition of celebrated teachers at the Mining Academy in Freiberg, Kegel can be considered as probably the last professor teaching the science of mining who was able to cover all the different disciplines. As was the case with a number of his predecessors, he was able to combine theoretical research work with the teaching of students and to support his theories with the practical experience of industry. He has apprenticed at the Mansfeld copper mines, went to the School of Mines at Eisleben (1896–8), worked as an engineer with various mining companies and thereafter became a scholar of the Berlin Mining Academy (1901–4). For twelve years he taught at the Bochum School of Mining until, in 1918, he was appointed Professor of Mining at Freiberg. There, one year later, as a new approach, he introduced lectures on brown-coal mining and mineral economics. He remained Professor at Freiberg until his first retirement in 1941, although he was active again between 1945 and 1951.In 1924 Kegel took over a department at the State Research Institute for Brown Coal in Freiberg which he extended into the Institute for Briquetting. In this field his main achievement lies in the initially questioned theory that producing briquettes from lignite is a molecular process rather than the result of bituminous factors. This perception, among others, led Rammler to produce coke from lignite in 1951. Kegel's merits result from having established all the aspects of mining and using lignite as an independent subdiscipline of mining science, based on substantial theories and an innovative understanding of applied technologies.[br]Bibliography1912, Bergmännische Wasserwirtschaft, Halle (Saale). 1931, Lehrbuch der Bergwirtschaft, Berlin.1941, Bergmännische Gebirgsmechanik, Halle (Saale). 1948, Brikettierung der Braunkohle, Halle (Saale).1953, Lehrbuch des Braunkohlentagebaus, Halle (Saale).Further ReadingE.Kroker, "Karl Kegel", Neue deutsche Biographie, Vol. XI, p. 394 (a reliable short account).Bergakademie Freiberg (ed.), 1976, Karl Kegel 1876–1959. Festschrift aus Anlaß seines100. Geburtstages, Leipzig (contains substantial biographical information).WK -
123 Krylov, Alexei Nicolaevitch
SUBJECT AREA: Ports and shipping[br]b. 15 August 1863 Visyoger, Siberiad. 26 October 1945 Leningrad (now St Petersburg), Russia[br]Russian academician and naval architect) exponent of a rigorous mathematical approach to the study of ship motions.[br]After schooling in France and Germany, Krylov returned to St Petersburg (as it then was) and in 1878 entered the Naval College. Upon graduating, he started work with the Naval Hydrographic Department; the combination of his genius and breadth of interest became apparent, and from 1888 until 1890 he undertook simultaneously a two-year university course in mathematics and a naval architecture course at his old college. On completion of his formal studies, Krylov commenced fifty years of service to the academic bodies of St Petersburg, including eight years as Superintendent of the Russian Admiralty Ship Model Experiment Tank. For many years he was Professor of Naval Architecture in the city, reorganizing the methods of teaching of his profession in Russia. It was during this period that he laid the foundations of his remarkable research and published the first of his many books destined to become internationally accepted in the fields of waves, rolling, ship motion and vibration. Practical work was not overlooked: he was responsible for the design of many vessels for the Imperial Russian Navy, including the battleships Sevastopol and Petropavlovsk, and went on, as Director of Naval Construction, to test anti-rolling tanks aboard military vessels in the North Atlantic in 1913. Following the Revolution, Krylov was employed by the Soviet Union to re-establish scientific links with other European countries, and on several occasions he acted as Superintendent in the procurement of important technical material from overseas. In 1919 he was appointed Head of the Marine Academy, and from then on participated in many scientific conferences and commissions, mainly in the shipbuilding field, and served on the Editorial Board of the well-respected Russian periodical Sudostroenie (Shipbuilding). The breadth of his personal research was demonstrated by the notable contributions he made to the Russian development of the gyro compass.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsMember, Russian Academy of Science 1814. Royal Institution of Naval Architects Gold Medal 1898. State Prize of the Soviet Union (first degree). Stalin Premium for work on compass deviation.BibliographyKrylov published more than 500 books, papers and articles; these have been collected and published in twelve volumes by the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. 1942, My Memories (autobiography).AK / FMWBiographical history of technology > Krylov, Alexei Nicolaevitch
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124 Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent
SUBJECT AREA: Chemical technology[br]b. 26 August 1743 Paris, Franced. 8 May 1794 Paris, France[br]French founder of the modern science of chemistry.[br]As well as receiving a formal education in law and literature, Lavoisier studied science under some of the leading figures of the day. This proved to be an ideal formation of the man in whom "man of science" and "public servant" were so intimately combined. His early work towards the first geological map of France and on the water supply of Paris helped to win him election to the Royal Academy of Sciences in 1768 at the youthful age of 25. In the same year he used some of his private income to buy a part-share in the "tax farm", a private company which leased from the Government the right to collect certain indirect taxes.In 1772 Lavoisier began his researches into the related phenomena of combustion, respiration and the calcination or oxidation of metals. This culminated in the early 1780s in the overthrow of the prevailing theory, based on an imponderable combustion principle called "phlogiston", and the substitution of the modern explanation of these processes. At the same time, understanding of the nature of acids, bases and salts was placed on a sounder footing. More important, Lavoisier defined a chemical element in its modern sense and showed how it should be applied by drawing up the first modern list of the chemical elements. With the revolution in chemistry initiated by Lavoisier, chemists could begin to understand correctly the fundamental processes of their science. This understanding was the foundationo of the astonishing advance in scientific and industrial chemistry that has taken place since then. As an academician, Lavoisier was paid by the Government to carry out investigations into a wide variety of practical questions with a chemical bias, such as the manufacture of starch and the distillation of phosphorus. In 1775 Louis XVI ordered the setting up of the Gunpowder Commission to improve the supply and quality of gunpowder, deficiencies in which had hampered France's war efforts. Lavoisier was a member of the Commission and, as usual, took the leading part, drawing up its report and supervising its implementation. As a result, the industry became profitable, output increased so that France could even export powder, and the range of the powder increased by two-thirds. This was a material factor in France's war effort in the Revolution and the Napoleonic wars.As if his chemical researches and official duties were not enough, Lavoisier began to apply his scientific principles to agriculture when he purchased an estate at Frechines, near Blois. After ten years' work on his experimental farm there, Lavoisier was able to describe his results in the memoir "Results of some agricultural experiments and reflections on their relation to political economy" (Paris, 1788), which holds historic importance in agriculture and economics. In spite of his services to the nation and to humanity, his association with the tax farm was to have tragic consequences: during the reign of terror in 1794 the Revolutionaries consigned to the guillotine all the tax farmers, including Lavoisier.[br]Bibliography1862–93, Oeuvres de Lavoisier, Vols I–IV, ed. J.B.A.Dumas; Vols V–VI, ed. E.Grimaux, Paris (Lavoisier's collected works).Further ReadingD.I.Duveen and H.S.Klickstein, 1954, A Bibliography of the Works of Antoine Laurent Lavoisier 1743–1794, London: William Dawson (contains valuable biographical material).D.McKie, 1952, Antoine Lavoisier, Scientist, Economist, Social Reformer, London: Constable (the best modern, general biography).H.Guerlac, 1975, Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, Chemist and Revolutionary, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons (a more recent work).LRDBiographical history of technology > Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent
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125 Lithgow, James
SUBJECT AREA: Ports and shipping[br]b. 27 January 1883 Port Glasgow, Renfrewshire, Scotlandd. 23 February 1952 Langbank, Renfrewshire, Scotland[br]Scottish shipbuilder; creator of one of the twentieth century's leading industrial organizations.[br]Lithgow attended Glasgow Academy and then spent a year in Paris. In 1901 he commenced a shipyard apprenticeship with Russell \& Co., where his father, William Lithgow, was sole proprietor. For years Russell's had topped the Clyde tonnage output and more than once had been the world's leading yard. Along with his brother Henry, Lithgow in 1908 was appointed a director, and in a few years he was Chairman and the yard was renamed Lithgows Ltd. By the outbreak of the First World War the Lithgow brothers were recognized as good shipbuilders and astute businessmen. In 1914 he joined the Royal Artillery; he rose to the rank of major and served with distinction, but his skills in administration were recognized and he was recalled home to become Director of Merchant Shipbuilding when British shipping losses due to submarine attack became critical. This appointment set a pattern, with public duties becoming predominant and the day-to-day shipyard business being organized by his brother. During the interwar years, Lithgow served on many councils designed to generate work and expand British commercial interests. His public appointments were legion, but none was as controversial as his directorship of National Shipbuilders Security Ltd, formed to purchase and "sterilize" inefficient shipyards that were hindering recovery from the Depression. To this day opinions are divided on this issue, but it is beyond doubt that Lithgow believed in the task in hand and served unstintingly. During the Second World War he was Controller of Merchant Shipbuilding and Repairs and was one of the few civilians to be on the Board of Admiralty. On the cessation of hostilities, Lithgow devoted time to research boards and to the expansion of the Lithgow Group, which now included the massive Fairfield Shipyard as well as steel, marine engineering and other companies.Throughout his life Lithgow worked for the Territorial Army, but he was also a devoted member of the Church of Scotland. He gave practical support to the lona Community, no doubt influenced by unbounded love of the West Highlands and Islands of Scotland.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsMilitary Cross and mentioned in dispatches during the First World War. Baronet 1925. Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire 1945. Commander of the Order of the Orange-Nassau (the Netherlands). CB 1947. Served as the employers' representative on the League of Nations International Labour Conference in the 1930s. President, British Iron and Steel Cofederation 1943.Further ReadingJ.M.Reid, 1964, James Lithgow, Master of Work, London: Hutchinson.FMW -
126 Marconi, Marchese Guglielmo
[br]b. 25 April 1874 Bologna, Italyd. 20 July 1937 Rome, Italy[br]Italian radio pioneer whose inventiveness and business skills made radio communication a practical proposition.[br]Marconi was educated in physics at Leghorn and at Bologna University. An avid experimenter, he worked in his parents' attic and, almost certainly aware of the recent work of Hertz and others, soon improved the performance of coherers and spark-gap transmitters. He also discovered for himself the use of earthing and of elevated metal plates as aerials. In 1895 he succeeded in transmitting telegraphy over a distance of 2 km (1¼ miles), but the Italian Telegraph authority rejected his invention, so in 1896 he moved to England, where he filed the first of many patents. There he gained the support of the Chief Engineer of the Post Office, and by the following year he had achieved communication across the Bristol Channel.The British Post Office was also slow to take up his work, so in 1897 he formed the Wireless Telegraph \& Signal Company to work independently. In 1898 he sold some equipment to the British Army for use in the Boer War and established the first permanent radio link from the Isle of Wight to the mainland. In 1899 he achieved communication across the English Channel (a distance of more than 31 miles or 50 km), the construction of a wireless station at Spezia, Italy, and the equipping of two US ships to report progress in the America's Cup yacht race, a venture that led to the formation of the American Marconi Company. In 1900 he won a contract from the British Admiralty to sell equipment and to train operators. Realizing that his business would be much more successful if he could offer his customers a complete radio-communication service (known today as a "turnkey" deal), he floated a new company, the Marconi International Marine Communications Company, while the old company became the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company.His greatest achievement occurred on 12 December 1901, when Morse telegraph signals from a transmitter at Poldhu in Cornwall were received at St John's, Newfoundland, a distance of some 2,100 miles (3,400 km), with the use of an aerial flown by a kite. As a result of this, Marconi's business prospered and he became internationally famous, receiving many honours for his endeavours, including the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1909. In 1904, radio was first used to provide a daily bulletin at sea, and in 1907 a transatlantic wireless telegraphy service was inaugurated. The rescue of 1,650 passengers from the shipwreck of SS Republic in 1909 was the first of many occasions when wireless was instrumental in saving lives at sea, most notable being those from the Titanic on its maiden voyage in April 1912; more lives would have been saved had there been sufficient lifeboats. Marconi was one of those who subsequently pressed for greater safety at sea. In 1910 he demonstrated the reception of long (8 km or 5 miles) waves from Ireland in Buenos Aires, but after the First World War he began to develop the use of short waves, which were more effectively reflected by the ionosphere. By 1918 the first link between England and Australia had been established, and in 1924 he was awarded a Post Office contract for short-wave communication between England and the various parts of the British Empire.With his achievements by then recognized by the Italian Government, in 1915 he was appointed Radio-Communications Adviser to the Italian armed forces, and in 1919 he was an Italian delegate to the Paris Peace Conference. From 1921 he lived on his yacht, the Elettra, and although he joined the Fascist Party in 1923, he later had reservations about Mussolini.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsNobel Prize for Physics (jointly with K.F. Braun) 1909. Russian Order of S t Anne. Commander of St Maurice and St Lazarus. Grand Cross of the Order of the Crown (i.e. Knight) of Italy 1902. Freedom of Rome 1903. Honorary DSc Oxford. Honorary LLD Glasgow. Chevalier of the Civil Order of Savoy 1905. Royal Society of Arts Albert Medal. Honorary knighthood (GCVO) 1914. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Medal of Honour 1920. Chairman, Royal Society of Arts 1924. Created Marquis (Marchese) 1929. Nominated to the Italian Senate 1929. President, Italian Academy 1930. Rector, University of St Andrews, Scotland, 1934.Bibliography1896, "Improvements in transmitting electrical impulses and in apparatus thereof", British patent no. 12,039.1 June 1898, British patent no. 12,326 (transformer or "jigger" resonant circuit).1901, British patent no. 7,777 (selective tuning).1904, British patent no. 763,772 ("four circuit" tuning arrangement).Further ReadingD.Marconi, 1962, My Father, Marconi.W.J.Baker, 1970, A History of the Marconi Company, London: Methuen.KFBiographical history of technology > Marconi, Marchese Guglielmo
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127 Monro, Philip Peter
SUBJECT AREA: Chemical technology[br]b. 27 May 1946 London, England[br]English biologist, inventor of a water-purification process by osmosis.[br]Monro's whole family background is engineering, an interest he did not share. Instead, he preferred biology, an enthusiasm aroused by reading the celebrated Science of Life by H.G. and G.P.Wells and Julian Huxley. Educated at a London comprehensive school, Monro found it necessary to attend evening classes while at school to take his advanced level science examinations. Lacking parental support, he could not pursue a degree course until he was 21 years old, and so he gained valuable practical experience as a research technician. He resumed his studies and took a zoology degree at Portsmouth Polytechnic. He then worked in a range of zoology and medical laboratories, culminating after twelve years as a Senior Experimental Officer at Southampton Medical School. In 1989 he relinquished his post to devote himself fall time to developing his inventions as Managing Director of Hampshire Advisory and Technical Services Ltd (HATS). Also in 1988 he obtained his PhD from Southampton University, in the field of embryology.Monro had meanwhile been demonstrating a talent for invention, mainly in microscopy. His most important invention, however, is of a water-purification system. The idea for it came from Michael Wilson of the Institute of Dental Surgery in London, who evolved a technique for osmotic production of sterile oral rehydration solutions, of particular use in treating infants suffering from diarrhoea in third-world countries. Monro broadened the original concept to include dried food, intravenous solutions and even dried blood. The process uses simple equipment and no external power and works as follows: a dry sugar/salts mixture is sealed in one compartment of a double bag, the common wall of which is a semipermeable membrane. Impure water is placed in the empty compartment and the water transfers across the membrane by the osmotic force of the sugar/salts. As the pores in the membrane exclude all viruses, bacteria and their toxins, a sterile solution is produced.With the help of a research fellowship granted for humanitarian reasons at King Alfred College, Winchester, the invention was developed to functional prototype stage in 1993, with worldwide patent protection. Commercial production was expected to follow, if sufficient financial backing were forthcoming. The process is not intended to replace large installations, but will revolutionize the small-scale production of sterile water in scattered third-world communities and in disaster areas where normal services have been disrupted.HATS was awarded First Prize in the small business category and was overall prize winner in the Toshiba Year of Invention, received a NatWest/BP award for technology and a Prince of Wales Award for Innovation.[br]Bibliography1993, with M.Wilson and W.A.M.Cutting, "Osmotic production of sterile oral rehydration solutions", Tropical Doctor 23:69–72.LRD -
128 Moxon, Joseph
SUBJECT AREA: Paper and printing[br]b. 8 August 1627 Wakefield, Yorkshire, England d. 1700[br]English publisher of mathematical and technical books.[br]Moxon acquired a knowledge of mathematics, map making and many technical arts, to which, as a result of some time spent in Holland, he added a knowledge of languages. By 1657 he was established in Cornhill in London, "at the sign of Atlas", where he published and sold "all manner of mathematical books or instruments and maps whatsoever". Soon after 1660, Moxon was appointed Hydrographer to King Charles II, i.e. map and chart printer and seller. By this time his shop was on Ludgate Hill, and in 1683 it had moved to the west side of Fleet Ditch, but retained its name "at the sign of Atlas". Moxon's most important publishing venture was a series of handbooks, never completed, entitled Mechanick Exercises or the Doctrine of Handy- Works. It was begun in 1677 and was intended to be published monthly and cover the whole range of practical techniques, such as metal-turning and woodworking. However, the series was suspended after a year or so due to the effects of the Popish Plot, which "took off the minds of my few customers from buying". He resumed publication with the most important of these works, Mechanick Exercises on the Whole Art of Printing, which appeared in 1683–4. Although printing had been invented more than two centuries earlier, this is the first detailed account in any language of printing, and includes all aspects of the process: type casting, setting, and construction and operation of the press itself, together with the organization of the printing shop. It served as the basis of future handbooks throughout the age of the hand press.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFRS 1678.Bibliography1683–4, Mechanick Exercises on the Whole Art of Printing, reprinted 1958, eds H.Davies and H.Carter, London: Oxford University Press (this facsimile reprint includes the most detailed account of Moxon's life and work, with full bibliographical details of the book itself).LRD
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