July 22, 1922] 



XATURE 



Calendar of Industrial Pioneers. 



July 23, 1875. Isaac Meritt Singer died. — The story 

 of the sewing machine is one of the romances of 

 modern industry. To such as Thomas in England, 

 Thimmonier in France, and Howe and Wilson in 

 America are due the main features of the machine, 

 but it was the Boston mechanic Singer who made it 

 available for even the poorer people. Singer patented 

 his machine in 1851 ; the Singer Manufacturing 

 Company dates from 1863, while the annual output 

 of machines rose from 21,000 in 1863 to 800,000 in 

 1896. To-dav the Company produces more than 

 2,000,000 machines a year. 



July 23, 1876. Henry Deacon died. — A successful 

 industrial chemist, Deacon was born on July 30, 1822, 

 in London, where at an earl}' age he came under the 

 influence of Faradav. He was trained as an engineer 

 by James Nasmyth — for whom it is said he made the 

 first model of the steam hammer — and afterwards 

 became manager of glass works and chemical works. 

 In 1855, with Gaskeli, he founded the firm of Gaskell, 

 Deacon and Co., manufacturing carbonate of soda, 

 attacking the ammonia soda process, and taking out 

 many valuable patents. With Gossage and Muspratt 

 he was one of the founders of the prosperity of Widnes. 



July 24, 1899. Sir Arthur Thomas Cotton died. — 

 Like his contemporarv, Sir Proby Thomas Cautley, 

 Cotton was trained as a soldier but became a great 

 irrigation engineer. He not only carried out many 

 of the earliest and most important irrigation schemes 

 in India, but he founded a school of hydraulic 

 engineers, which is still engaged in the development 

 of the resources of the Indian rivers. 



July 25, 1843. Charles Macintosh died. — Born in 

 Glasgow, December 29, 1766, Macintosh was enabled 

 to attend Black's lectures at Edinburgh, and in 1786 

 he set up as a manufacturing chemist. In 1797 

 he started the first alum works in Scotland, and for 

 mam- years was connected with Charles Tennant 

 of the St. Rollox Works, Glasgow. His name is 

 popularly known at the present time, however, for 

 his invention in 1823 of a method of making cloth 

 waterproof by cementing two thicknesses together 

 with a solution of rubber in naphtha, an invention 

 which, together with the discoveries of Goodyear and 

 Hancock, laid the foundation of the rubber industry. 



July 28, 1886. Sir John Anderson died. — An 

 eminent mechanical engineer, Anderson was trained 

 in Scotland, and after working with Fairbairn, John 

 Pen n, and David Xapier was appointed in 1842 to Wool- 

 wich Arsenal, where he effected a complete revolution 

 in the method of manufacturing guns and small arms, 

 and ultimately became superintendent of machinery'. 

 He wrote a treatise on the strength of materials, 

 lectured at the Royal Military Academy, and was offi- 

 cially connected with some of the great exhibitions. 



July 29, 1708. Swalm Renkin died. — Known 

 as the constructor of the famous " Machine de Marli," 

 Renkin was born at Liege in 1644, and at an early 

 age acquired a high reputation for his skill as a 

 carpenter and millwright. Employed by Louis XIV. 

 on the plans for conveying the water of the Seine 

 to the fountains and works at Versailles, Renkin 

 began the great machine in 1675 and completed it 

 in 1682. The machine is said to have cost 8,000,000/. 

 It consisted of 14 water-wheels driving no fewer than 

 253 pumps, some of which worked at a distance of 

 three-quarters of a mile by chains and rods. The 

 water was raised in three stages to a height of 533 feet, 

 whence it flowed to Versailles by an aqueduct. This 

 " gigantic specimen of a race of mechanical megalo- 

 saurians " was dismantled in 181 7, and the water 

 pumped by one of Watt's steam engines. E. C. S. 



NO. 2751, VOL. I 10] 



Societies and Academies. 



London. 



Faraday Society, June 26. — A. W. Porter and J. J. 

 Hodges : The law of the distribution of particles in 

 colloidal suspensions with special reference to Perrin's 

 investigations. Perrin found that the particles of 

 a suspensoid distribute themselves according to the 

 same law as the molecules in an atmosphere of gas ; 

 but his experiments extended over only a very 

 small range of depth. Observations have been 

 extended over a much greater range and wide 

 divergence from the gas law is found ; e.g. for the 

 concentrations employed the concentration becomes 

 sensibly uniform in a depth of one millimetre. Curves 

 are fitted to the observations and the question is 

 examined theoretically as well as experimentally. — 

 W. R. Cooper : The electrochemical effects produced 

 by superimposing alternating currents upon direct 

 currents. Previous authors have shown that when 

 an alternating current is superimposed on a direct 

 current increased corrosion is obtainable and the 

 overvoltage may also be reduced. It is now found 

 that low frequency currents do not affect the amount 

 of deposition or corrosion in the case of copper plates 

 in copper sulphate. The view expressed by Goodwin 

 and Knobel that alternating currents affect hydrogen 

 overvoltage only when the conditions are such as 

 to give a reversal of current in each period appears 

 to be incorrect. The effect increases as the strength 

 of the alternating current is increased, but the 

 percentage effect becomes less, and takes an ap- 

 preciable time to pass off when the current is dis- 

 continued. With platinum wire electrodes in dilute 

 sulphuric acid, low frequency current gives the 

 greatest effect when the applied voltage for the direct 

 current is below the decomposition voltage, but this 

 is not the case with high frequency currents. The 

 absorption of hydrogen is very marked and there are 

 other differences between the electrodes. If a fine 

 platinum wire and a comparatively large platinum 

 surface are used as electrodes, a high frequency 

 current causes an electric discharge to take place 

 under certain conditions. The resulting bubble 

 forms in the body of the electrolyte, at a distance 

 from the electrode, and the discharge is luminous 

 in the dark. — T. M. Lowry and E. E. Walker : Ex- 

 pansion and shrinkage during caking of potassium 

 carbonate. Photographic evidence is given of the 

 expansion and subsequent shrinkage of an old package 

 of potassium carbonate, after emptying out into a 

 jar. Attempts to produce artificially such an ex- 

 pansion in various modifications of potassium 

 carbonate have led to negative results. A possible 

 explanation of the expansion assumes the presence 

 in the material of a sesquihydrate, which expands 

 on conversion into the dihydrate. Data are given 

 in reference to the methods of preparation of this 

 sesquicarbonate. — T. M. Lowry and L. P. McHatton : 

 The powdering of minerals by decrepitation. 

 The decrepitation of barytes may be attributed, 

 as in the case of water-soluble salts such as lead 

 nitrate, to the presence of included water ; clear 

 fragments have been obtained which are completely 

 resistant to decrepitation by heat and a semi- 

 quantitative relationship has been found between 

 the water-content of barytes and the fineness of the 

 powder produced by decrepitation. The decrepita- 

 tion of celestine, crocoite, and common salt has also 

 been investigated. — A. M. Williams : Two properties 

 of powders. It is suggested that specific surface 

 should be referred to unit mass and not to unit 

 volume, owing to the relative difficulty of measuring 



