Today (March 8, 1873) is the Memorial Day of Robert William Thomson, who greatly improved the comfort of travel and invented the pneumatic tire.
Robert William Thomson was born
on June 26, 1822, in Stonehaven, northeast Scotland. He was baptized on 26 July
1822 in a Scottish church. Robert was the eleventh of twelve children of a
local wool mill owner. His family wanted him to study for the ministry. But
Robert refused. The reason is the inability to master the Latin language.
Robert left school at the age of 14 and moved to Charleston, USA to live with
his uncle. There he trained as a merchant. He returned home two years later. He
studied chemistry, electricity and astronomy with the help of a local weaver
who was well versed in mathematics.
Robert's father gave him a
workshop. When he was 17, he rebuilt his mother's laundry room. Thus the wet
cloth can be passed through the rollers in both directions. Successfully
designed and finished ribbon the first working model of his elliptical rotary
steam engine he completed in later life. He trained in engineering in Aberdeen
and Dundee before joining a civil engineering company in Glasgow. He then went
to work for the Edinburgh Institute of Civil Engineers. There he devised a new
method of exploding explosive charges by using electricity. He thus greatly
reduced the loss of life in mines around the world.
Thomson next worked as a railway
engineer and oversaw the eruption of limestone dunes near the Southeastern
Railway Dover. He soon set up his own railway consulting business and proposed
the route for the Eastern District Railway. It was approved by Parliament and
eventually developed. Thomson was 23 years old when he patented his pneumatic
tire. He was patented in France in 1846 and in the United States in 1847. His
tire had an India-rubber plain belt. Thus the wheels provided "a mattress
that runs on the ground, train or track." The rolled leather was attached
to this elastic belt wheel of rubberized canvas into a strong outer casing.
Thomson's "Aerial Wheels" were demonstrated in March 1847 at Regents
Park in London, and were fitted to several horse-drawn carriages. They greatly
improved the comfort of the trip and reduced the noise. One set ran 1200 miles
without any sign of deterioration. In 1849 he invented the fountain pen.
In 1863 he was elected a Fellow
of the Edinburgh Royal Society. From 1869 to 1871 he served as president of the
Royal Scottish Society of Arts. He collected a large sum of his inventions and
lived in a large townhouse at 3 More Place in Moree Garden, West Edinburgh.
Robert William Thomson, who invented the tire, died on March 8, 1873, at his
51st home in Edinburgh. He was buried in Dean Cemetery in West Edinburgh.
Source By: Wikipedia
Information: Ramesh, Assistant
Professor of Physics, Nehru Memorial College, Puthanampatti, Trichy.
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