14 THE DELAMATER IRON WORKS— 



making the drawings. He devised a method of sweeping propeller wheel moulds 

 in loam which has been in use ever since. This not only eliminated the expense of 

 an elaborate pattern but developed a truer screw. The works became famous for 

 its propeller wheels .after this, and for many years it probably turned out more cast- 

 ings of this type than all the foundries in the country put together, running over 

 one thousand .a year. 



In 1867 Mr. DeLamater decided to take a respite and perhaps retire from busi- 

 ness altogether. He placed David M. Ripley in charge of the office and made Jerry 

 Mulford general superintendent of the works. Mr. Reynolds became consulting en- 

 gineer for several outside interests, notably the Zalinski Pneumatic Gun Company, 

 and acted only in the same capacity with the works. After a year's absence Mr. 

 DeLamater becaine restless and responded to the solicitation of Captain Ericsson 

 and took up the reins again. 



Meanwhile Captain Ericsson had developed a new caloric engine for pumping 

 water. The city was growing rapidly and Croton water would not run even to the 

 third story of the buildings. Land values were increasing, causing people to build 

 higher houses, and of course it was necessary to have a means of supplying water 

 to their upper floors. The only available plan at that time was to have a tank on 

 the roof and an engine in the basement. The engine had to be absolutely safe and 

 reliable and simple enough to be attended to by the janitor or his wife who, as a rule, 

 were rather an ignorant lot. The caloric engine answered these conditions perfectly, 

 so between "Ericsson Pumpers" for the smaller sizes and Rider's hot air pumping 

 engines for the larger, they did a business of about 12,000 in New York City alone. 

 Alex. Miller, son of the head foreman, handled the Ericsson caloric engine and Tom 

 Rider had charge of the Rider steam engine and the Rider hot air pumping en- 

 gine. All this time they were doing a lot of marine work, building new engines 

 and boilers and repair work. 



After a while Alex. Miller left the works, and Tom Rider was given charge of 

 all the caloric engine work. Rider wanted to improve the efficiency of the Ericsson 

 Pumper, but Mr. DeLamater strongly opposed tampering with it on account of his 

 confidence in Captain Ericsson's ability. Finally, however, he allowed him to experi- 

 ment with it and the result was most gratifying, for he increased its pumping ca- 

 pacity over 80 per cent. 



Alexander Rider also developed a gas engine, and it may be interesting to note 

 that he was the inventor of the method of igniting the gas with a spark generated 

 by a dynamo which is now in general use in all internal-combustion engines. 



In 1864, A. P. Robinson, an engineer, had designed a steam subway somewhat 

 after the character of the London subways, but he did not develop it. This was 

 followed by the Beach pneumatic transit system of subway construction, projected 

 by Alfred E. Beach, proprietor of the Scientific American, who succeeded in ob- 

 taining a franchise to install two small tubes side by side for transporting packages 

 from the City Hall up Broadway to Harlem. Beach exhibited an experimental sec- 

 tion of a tunnel 9 feet in diameter in 1867 at the American Institute Fair in Ar- 



