Today in Technology History
An event that occurred on this date in the history of technology.
(Published weekdays. To receive "Today in Technology History" by e-mail, click here. To read past issues, click here.)
June 12
Inventor and early electrical engineer Fleeming Jenkin died exactly 118 years ago.
Henry Charles Fleeming Jenkin was born in Kent, England in 1833; his father was a dull naval officer and his mother was a charming artist, musician and writer. The Jenkin family fell on hard times and so moved to continental Europe in the late 1840s. The education of young Fleeming (pronounced FLEMM-ing) was therefore continued in Frankfurt, Paris and Genoa; he obtained a master's degree in science before his family moved back to Britain.
After working a few years as a surveyor, a draftsman and then a mechanical engineer, Jenkin began a lifelong acquaintance with Sir William Thomson -- better known as Lord Kelvin, the great scientist. Jenkin and Thomson collaborated on research relating to electrical cables, and Jenkin spent more than a decade working on various projects concerning underwater telegraph cables. Not only did Jenkin conduct basic scientific research on various cable materials, but he also took several sea voyages to personally oversee the laying of submarine telegraph lines.
Starting in about 1882, Jenkin took an interest in the use of electricity to transport goods and materials. In Jenkin's system, cargo carriers would be suspended from overhead rods or cables called "telphers" -- a word Jenkin coined, derived from the Greek for "carry" and "far." An electrical cable would supply power to the suspended cars, which could zip materials from place to place. Jenkin, according to a biographer, envisioned "a world filled with telpherage wires."
Unfortunately, Fleeming Jenkin never got to see his telpherage project get off the ground. He died unexpectedly on June 12, 1885 at the age of 52, apparently because of an infection after a minor foot operation.
Related links:
The novelist Robert Louis Stevenson wrote a beautiful biography of Jenkin after the inventor's death. You can read it online in PDF format (suggested) or plaintext format.
To read more about underwater telegraph cables, check out this tech history message from two years ago.
| Biotechnology | Convergence | Creativity | Culture | E-conomics | Education |
| Equity | Gov't & Politics | Innovation | National Security | Personal Security |
BE SURE TO VISIT THE NEW ATLANTIS: A JOURNAL OF TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY.
For errors, broken links, questions or comments,
contact webmaster@tecsoc.org.
