Great Engineers and Pioneers and their Education

Submitted by Richard on Sat, 05/05/2012 - 5:59pm
Trained men and apprentices contributed greatly to the Industrial Revolution but it must be remembered that the majority never had never studied at university or enjoyed any significant period in a school education. The majority of these remarkable individuals came through the apprenticeship route, taught themselves or gained their experience in the work place. Many possessed a natural innate ability to solve engineering problems. The Industrial Revolution owed little to education systems or to direct action from the state. It is also interesting to note how many of these individuals were from Scotland.
A good example is the development of machine tools. The key players were Joseph Bramah, Joseph Clements, Henry Maudslay, William Muir, Richard Roberts and Joseph Whitworth . All started as manual workers but made their engineering contribution through the application of geometry, a working knowledge of metals, and the gradual improvement in precision, accuracy and replication of machine tools.  
In addition people like Telford and Maudslay also trained many individuals through apprenticeships who then went on to make their own discoveries and inventions including Joseph Clement, Joseph Whitworth, Richard Roberts and James Nasmyth.
The list is by no means complete but I intend to add more detail as my researches continue.

 

Individual
Dates
Discoveries/Other Achievements
Education/Training (if known) and/or occupation
Richard Arkwright
 
 
1732-92
 
Industrialist and inventor. Automatic spinning frame (1769)
 
Apprenticeship but mainly self taught. Started a successful career as a barber specialising in dyeing hair. Became interested in spinning and his frame invention  was financially supported by Strutt and Need a Nottingham manufacturer
 
 
 
 
William Armstrong
 
1810-1900
Industrialist and inventor. Hydraulic engines, cranes  and swing bridges and then ordnance manufacture
Articled solicitor but turned to engineering
Charles Babbage
1791-1871
Mathematician/Inventor /writer including calculating machines/founder of Royal Statistical Society, Astronomical Society and the British Association/ophthalmoscope/railway signals
Cambridge university
Henry Bell
1767-1830
Engineer. Steam boats – first passenger-carrying steamboat in European waters.
Apprenticeship/millwright/stone mason/carpenter
Henry Bessemer
1813-98
Pioneer metallurgist and inventor. Bessemer steel converter 1756
Self taught and learnt metallurgy in his father’s foundry
William Bickford
1774-1834
Inventor. Miner’s safety fuse (1831)
Apprenticeship/leather worker
J G Bodmer
1786-1864
Inventor. Pioneer of the assembly line. Major contributions to a wide range of machines using steam, water to drive textile mills armaments and locomotives. Founded the Chorlton Mills in Manchester
Swiss born and a skilled mechanical engineer
Matthew Boulton
1728-1809
Inventor. Steam engine technology. Manufactured many metal products including buttons, coins, and clocks.
Brilliant business person who factory offered many good opportunities to apprentices and employees. Worked closely with James Watt
Joseph Bramah
1748-1814
Inventor. Water closet (1778)/Safety locks (unpickable/hydraulic press/fire engine and a beer machine for use in pubs. Also invented a machine for printing bank notes
Apprenticeship to village carpenter. Became a cabinetmaker in London.  He went on to train many other mechanics and inventors including one of the first proposals to create a screw-propeller.
James Brindley
1716-72
Engineer and canal builder e.g. Trent and the Barton aqueduct; discovered the process of puddle clay linings to canals. Mersey canal started in 1766
Apprenticeship as a millwright and self taught but possessed an instinctive ability for engineering.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel
1806-59
Engineer and inventor. Railway/ship engineering/bridge and tunnel building
Attended boarding school then to a school in France (College of Caen) and the Lycee Henri Quatre in Paris and gained valuable work experience with Maudslay and Son and Field.
 
Edmund Cartwright
1743-1823
Inventor. Power- loom (1787)/Wool-combing machine
Oxford – trained at Wakefield and Oxford for the church. Became interested in weaving and with other craftsmen developed the power-loom.
Henry Cavendish
1731-1810
Pioneering investigator in electricity, discovered hydrogen. Torsion balance to determine the mean density of the earth
Cambridge but left without a degree. Conducted research very much alone. Cavendish Laboratory established in 1871 in his honour.
John Clement
 
Invented the metal-plning machine and improved lathe design. Engineer to Charles Babbage
Attended a local village school for a short period. Apprenticed thatcher and slater.Later worked for Bramah Maudslay
Henry Cort
1740-1800
Navy agent and Inventor e.g. the Cort process converting pig iron into wrought iron patented in 1783/84
Naval agent/clerk where he managed a forge in Gosport Hampshire where is researched processes and invented the puddling process.
Richard Crawshay
1739-1810
Introduced Cort’s puddling process.
Apprenticeship
Samuel Crompton
1753-1827
Improved the Spinning Mule (1779)
Well educated but with no mechanical training largely self-taught
William Cubitt
1785-1861
Civil engineer. Canal/railways. Invented the treadmill and involved in the construction of the Great Exhibition Hall 0f 1851.
Apprenticeship worked as a miller, cabinet- maker and a millwright until 1821 when he went to Ransome’s factory near Ipswich.
John Dalton
1766-1844
Atomic theory (1808), scientific experimenter invented the hygrometer
Basic school education (Quaker)
Erasmus Darwin
1731-1802
Physician. Founded the Derby Philosophical Society/Lunar Society member
Cambridge/Edinburgh
Michael Faraday
1791-1867
Physicist and chemist. Pioneering electrical engineer;  invented amongst other items the electric motor, transformer and the dynamo
Self-taught apprenticed to a book binder. Worked with Humphry Davy and succeeded Davys chair of chemistry at the Royal Institution famous for the Christmas lectures
James Hargreaves/Hargraves
1719-78
Inventor. Spinning loom (1764)
Little formal education/self-taught. Worked as a weaver and carpenter.
 
 
 
 
John Harrison
1693-1776
Inventor and horologist. Clocks/Chronometer. Invented the gridiron pendulum and the remontoir escapement.
Little formal education/self-taught
John Heathcoat
1783-1861
Inventor of a lace, ribbon and net –making machine
Apprenticeship (Knitting machines)
John Kay
1704-1780
Inventor. Flying shuttle (1738)
Educated in France
James Keir
1735-1820
Assisted Priestley in experiments/Chemical research. Lunar Society member.
Edinburgh High School and University where he studied medicine.
John McAdam
1756-1836
Pioneer road designer and builder
Wealthy individual who invested his own money in improving road design and building – process he invent named after him ‘roads were macadamised’
William McNaught
1813-81
Mechanical engineer and inventor. Compound steam engine (1845)
Trained as a marine engineer/Attended Andersonian/Anderson’s Institution
Henry Maudslay
1771-1831
Engineer and inventor. Machine tools e.g. table-engine 1807. Patents for calico printing, small steam engines and the differential for lathes.
Apprenticeship (Blacksmiths) but did not serve the full 7 years but was taken on by Joseph Bramah for 9 years gaining valuable experience of engineering and manufacturing processes.
Jack Metcalf
1717-1810
Engineer. Pioneer  road-building
No formal training. A truly remarkable individual totally blind since the age of 6 Possessed an inexplicable 6th sense and talent. He went on to design and build roads in Yorkshire, Lancashire and Derbyshire e.g. Macclesfield-Chapel-en-le-Frith and Buxton -Whaley Bridge. Over 180 miles of roads stand to his genius
William Murdock/Murdoch
1754-1839
Engineer. Gas lighting/steam coach/Lunar Society
Initially worked with father as a millwright. Gained further experience with Boulton and Watts factory i.e. learnt on the job
Matthew Murray
1765-1826
Mechanical engineer and inventor. Yarn manufacture
Apprenticeship (Blacksmith). Improved the design of the steam engine as well as developing textile machinery
James Muspratt
1793-1886
Chemist and industrialist. Chemical industries
Apprenticeship (Druggist)
James Nasmyth
1808-90
Engineer. Machine tools e.g. steam hammer 1839 and the steam pile driver which revolutionised the construction of bridges.
Attended Edinburgh High School for 3 years but left at 12. Attended evening classes at Edinburgh School of Arts (really a technical college) his father also helped with his education. In addition he continued to teach himself. He went to work with Maudslay and Sons and Field and gained valuable experience.
James Neilson
1792-1865
Engineer. Blast furnace in steel manufacture/Founded the Glasgow Gas Workmen’s Institution (1821)
Little formal education/self taught
Thomas Newcomen
1663-1729
Inventor. Steam engine design/First efficient atmospheric steam engine
Blacksmith/Ironmonger worked with Thomas savery
Thomas Percival
1740-1804
Significant figure in the Manchester Lit and Phil movement
Warrington Dissenting Academy/Edinburgh and Leyden gaining a MD.
William Perkin
1838-1907
Chemist. Initially researched synthesising coal-tar but then moved to textile dyes creating a number of synthetic dyes
Royal College of Chemistry studied and worked with August Hofmann
William Pilkington
1800-72
Industrialist. Glass making
Left school at 18
Lyon Playfair
1818-98
Chemist/technical education advocate and served on many committees including those on scientific and technical education
Edinburgh and Glasgow Universities/Giessen University Germany
Joseph Priestley
 
 
1773-1804
Chemist and clergyman. Discovered oxygen and researched electrical science/Lunar Society member. Tutor at Warrington Academy and New College Hackney.
Grammar school/home tuition/Daventry Dissenting Academy
Jesse Ramsden
1735-1800
Instrument maker e.g. screw cutting lathe 1770/dividing engine 1775
Apprenticeship
Richard Roberts
1789-1864
Mechanical engineer and inventor. Invented a screw-cutting machine, gas meter and planning machines used in spinning machinery
Worked initially in a quarry as a labourer. Apprenticed and pupil of Henry Maudslay after running away from recruiting sergeants
Benjamin Rumford
1753-1814
Scientist and administrator. Investigator of energy/Invented the shadow photometer and introduced the concept of the standard candle/Technical education/Royal Institution
School/Apprenticeship/Harvard University
Thomas Savery
1650-1715
Inventor and military engineer. Invented the paddle system on boats. Invented the first practical steam engine in 1698 which was improved by Thomas Newcomen.  
Military engineer
Samuel Seaward
1800-42
Cranes, dredgers, swing bridges and many other inventions
A pupil of Henry Maudslay
John Smeaton
1724-92
Civil engineer. Researched the mechanics of waterwheels and windmills. Lighthouse design e.g. Eddystone. Improved the Newcomen atmospheric steam engine
School/Apprenticeship. Worked as a mathematical-instrument maker.
George Stephenson
1781-1848
Railway engineer. Steam locomotives
Evening classes three nights a week paying 4 pence a week. Gained direct work experience in mining engineering /Apprenticeship
Robert Stephenson
1803-59
Mechanical and structural engineer. Steam locomotive design/bridges
Self-taught with help from his father George. Attended a village school and then his father sent him to a private school and then apprenticed at Killingworth Colliery which he did not complete but then gained valuable experience in railway engineering
Jedediah Strutt
1726-97
Knitting machines worked with Richard Arkwright
Self taught: started as a farmer
Thomas Telford
1757-1834
Civil engineer. Canal/road engineer e.g. Caledonian canal started in 1804. Innovative Aqueduct and bridge design and construction.
Attended a local parish school. Apprenticeship (Stonemason) Langholm and self taught.
Charles Tennant
1768-1838
Chemist and industrialist. Textiles/Dying
Studied at a local school then apprenticeship as a silk weaver
Richard Trevithick
1771-1833
Engineer and inventor. Steam engine (High-pressure steam engine 1800
Attended a local school but largely self taught and became a mining engineer
Jethro Tull
1674-1741
Agriculturalist. Seed drill (1701)/Introduction of improved farming methods
Oxford university
James Watt
1736-1819
Engineer and inventor. Steam engine design/Lunar Society
Taught by mother then some formal schooling-Greenock Grammar School and eventually gained experience as an instrument maker at Glasgow University. A mechanical genius who was very versatile.
Josiah Wedgewood
1730-95
Chemist specialising in pottery/Lunar Society
Self educated/Apprenticeship (Pottery/thrower) but because of ill health broke the indenture and experimented with decorations, clay types and furnace technology.
Joseph Whitworth
1803-87
Engineer and inventor. Machine tools/Screw threads. Planing machines, a power- driven self-acting machine and measuring machines. Established the Whitworth scholarships.
Attended his father’s school then as a boarder at a private school at Idle near Leeds but left at 14. Apprenticeship (Cotton spinning) and gained valuable work experience in Manchester and London engineering companies including the Maudslay workshops
John Wilkinson
1728-1808
Ironworker and inventor. Boring machine
Learnt working at his father’s side