182 
Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. [Sess. 
OBITUARY NOTICES. 
Sir John Jackson, Kt., LL.D. By David Alan Stevenson, 
B.Sc, M.Inst.C.E. 
(MS. received and read June 21, 1920.) 
Sir John Jackson, the head of the well-known firm of “Sir John 
Jackson, Limited,” was born at York in 1851. Immediately on leaving 
school he entered workshops in Newcastle to learn the mechanical side 
of the profession that he was ultimately to follow, and from there he 
proceeded to Edinburgh University to study science and engineering 
generally. At the university he came under the influence of the late 
Professor Tait, and so impressed was he with the value of the training he 
received in Tait’s laboratory that, when Tait died, Sir John founded the 
“ Tait Memorial Fund” to encourage physical research. 
At the early age of twenty-five he obtained his first contract, and soon 
afterwards he was entrusted with the contract for the completion of 
Stobcross Docks, Glasgow, a difficult and important work involving the 
sinking of cylinders in soft ground, at that time a novel form of construct- 
ing foundations. This was rapidly followed by such important under- 
takings as Middlesbrough, Hartlepool, and North Sunderland Docks, the 
extension of the Admiralty Pier at Dover, the completion of the last 
eight miles of the Manchester Ship Canal, in connection with which he was 
knighted, the Dover Commercial Harbour, the foundations of the Tower 
Bridge, docks at Swansea, Methil, and Burntisland, and a deep lock at 
Barry. The greatest undertaking in this country he was responsible for 
was undoubtedly the extension of the Admiralty Works at Keyham, a work 
of peculiar engineering difficulty on account of the great depth to which 
the foundations had to be carried, which took ten years to complete and 
cost nearly £4,000,000. 
Abroad, no less than at home, he was entrusted with the execution of 
important undertakings. He constructed the Naval Harbour and Graving 
Dock at Simon’s Town in Cape Colony, important harbour works at Singa- 
pore, and a breakwater at Victoria in British Columbia. He advised the 
Austro-Hungarian Government on the extension of the Arsenal Works at 
