8 THOMSON, Presidential Address. 



Kelso, in Roxburghshire, 1789. Elected to this Society 1824. 

 He was imperfectly educated in his youth. His father was a 

 farm bailiff. Fairbairn worked at various mechanical places 

 in England, and finally? settled in Manchester, without either 

 capital or connections, in 18 17. He published papers on the 

 strengths oif materials, which were of great value, and con- 

 structed along with Robert; ^Stephenson, assisted by the calcu- 

 lating genius of Eaton Hodgkinson, F.R.S., the celebrated 

 Britannia and Conway tubular, bridges. Fairbairn was Presi- 

 dent of this Society from 185^5 till i860. He died at Moor 

 Park, Surrey, 18th August, 1874, aged 85 years. 



Eaton Hodgkinson, F.R.S., was born at Anderton, near 

 Northwich, Cheshire, 26th February, 1789, and died 18th June, 

 (t86i, aged 72. He was elected a member of this Society 

 1820, and acted as President from 1848 till 1851. He was 

 Professor of the Mechanical Principles of Engineering in 

 University College, London. His scientific labours consisted 

 chiefly in making .several long and elaborate series of experi- 

 ments on the strength of materials used in construction, chiefly 

 timber and iron. 



John Frederick Bateman, F.R.S., son-in-law of Sir William 

 Fairbairn, was elected 1840. He was engineer to slome of the 

 greatest waterworks in the world, that of Manchester, to which 

 the water is brought from Woodhead, and that of Glasgow, 

 to which the supply comes from Loch Katrine. )In 1881 he was 

 engaged on the Thirlmere scheme. 



■Sir John Hawkshaw, another eminent water engineer, 

 elected 1839, was st;ill a member of the Society in 1881, when 

 he left Manchester. 



William Sturgeon, the celebrated electrician, born at Whit- 

 tington, Lancaster, in 1783, spant his time from 1838 till his 

 death (8th December, 1850) in close relations with this Society. 

 He was elected a melmber in 1844. To keep his father — a 

 clever man, but an idle shoemaker — poaching fish and rearing 

 gamecocks, when starving the family, was the painful work 

 of young Sturgeon. Hej quitted shoemaking to enlist in the 

 Westmoreland Militia, afterwards served twenty years in Ithe 

 Royal Artillery, and subsequently obtained the appointment 

 of Teacher of Natural Philosophy in the East India Com- 

 pany's Military College in Addiscombe. Whilst serving in the 

 Artillery his attention was awakened and his curiosity quickened 

 by the phenomena of a terriifne thunderstorm, and tthis set him 

 to the study of electricity. He Jbegan the study of Mathematics, 

 Latin and Greek, and French, German, and Italian, which he 

 read with considerable facility. No man contributed a greater 



