Men of Invention and Industry
Men of Invention and Industry
Phineas Pett : beginnings of English shipbuilding -- Francis Pettit Smith, practical introducer of the screw propeller -- John Harrison, inventor of the marine chronometer -- John Lombe, introducer of the silk industry into England -- William Murdock, his life and inventions -- Frederick Koenig, inventor of the steam-printing machine -- The Walters of the "Times" : invention of the Walter press -- William Clowes : book-printing by steam -- Charles Bianconi : a lesson of self-help in Ireland -- Industry in Ireland : through Connaught and Ulster to Belfast -- Ship-building in Belfast / by E.J. Harland, engineer and shipbuilder -- Astronomers and students in humble life : a new chapter in the "Pursuit of knowledge under difficulties".
Book Excerpt
ome years been employed in the haulage of coals; but it was not until the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1830, that the importance of the invention came to be acknowledged. The locomotive railway has since been everywhere adopted throughout Europe. In America, Canada, and the Colonies, it has opened up the boundless resources of the soil, bringing the country nearer to the towns, and the towns to the country. It has enhanced the celerity of time, and imparted a new series of conditions to every rank of life.
The importance of steam navigation has been still more recently ascertained. When it was first proposed, Sir Joseph Banks, President of the Royal Society, said: "It is a pretty plan, but there is just one point overlooked: that the steam-engine requires a firm basis on which to work." Symington, the practical mechanic, put this theory to the test by his successful experiments, first on Dalswinton Lake, and then on the Forth and Clyde Canal. Fulton and Bell afterwards showed the
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