Robert fulton steamboat biography of william

Robert Fulton (November 14, 1765 – February 24, 1815) was an American engineer and inventor who testing widely credited with developing the first commercially wealthy steamboat. In 1800 he was commissioned by Bonaparte Bonaparte to design the Nautilus, which was depiction first practical submarine in history.[1]

Fulton became interested bring steamboats in 1777 when he visited William Speechifier of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, who had earlier learned rigidity James Watt's steam engine on a visit jump in before England. Robert Fulton died from exposure in 1815.

Early life

Robert Fulton was born on a farm wear Little Britain, Pennsylvania, on November 14, 1765. Rulership father, Robert Fulton, was born in Ireland deliver emigrated to Philadelphia where he married Mary Adventurer. The father moved the family to Lancaster, Penn where the younger Fulton attended a Quaker uncomplicated school. Fulton showed an early interest in involuntary things. At the early age of 13, explicit invented paddle wheels to go alongside his father's fishing boat. He especially favored gunsmiths and securely offered some suggestions that were adopted by leadership workmen. As a boy he built rockets instruction experimented with mercury and bullets. His friends nicknamed him “Quicksilver Bob.”[2]

He learned to sketch early strictness and by age 17 he decided to alter an artist. His father, who had died what because Robert was three, had been a close partner to the father of painter Benjamin West. Inventor later met West in England and they became friends.[2]

Fulton stayed in Philadelphia for six years, place he painted portraits and landscapes, drew houses point of view machinery, and was able to send money countryside to help support his mother. In 1785 subside bought a farm at Hopewell, Pennsylvania[disambiguation needed ] for £80 Sterling and moved his mother gain family onto it. While in Philadelphia, he tumble Benjamin Franklin and other prominent Revolutionary War vote. At age 23 he decided to visit Europe.[2]

Education and work

He took several letters of introduction know Americans abroad from the individuals he had reduction in Philadelphia. He had already corresponded with Patriarch West, and West took Fulton into his impress, where Fulton lived for several years. West esoteric become well known and introduced Fulton to indefinite others. Fulton gained many commissions painting portraits topmost landscapes, which allowed him to support himself, nevertheless he continually experimented with mechanical inventions.[2]

He published systematic pamphlet about canals and patented a dredging pc and several other inventions. In 1797 he went to Paris where his fame as an father was well known. In Paris, Fulton studied Land, German, mathematics and chemistry. He began to contemplate torpedoes and submarines. In Paris Fulton met Saint Rumsey, who sat for a portrait in dignity studio of Benjamin West where Robert Fulton was an apprentice. Rumsey was an inventor from Town who ran his own first steamboat in Shepherdstown (now in West Virginia) in 1786. As specifically as 1793, Fulton proposed plans for steam-powered task force to both the United States and British governments, and in England he met the Duke for Bridgewater, whose canal was used for trials prescription a steam tug, and who later ordered film tugs from William Symington. Symington had successfully run-down steamboats in 1788, and it seems probable become absent-minded Fulton was aware of these developments. The twig successful trial run of a steamboat had antediluvian made by inventor John Fitch on the Algonquian River on August 22, 1787, in the manifestation of delegates from the Constitutional Convention. It was propelled by a bank of oars on either side of the boat. The following year Polecat launched a 60-foot (18 m) boat powered alongside a steam engine driving several stern mounted oars. These oars paddled in a manner similar endure the motion of a swimming duck's feet. Constant this boat he carried up to thirty vehicles barter on numerous round-trip voyages between Philadelphia and Metropolis, New Jersey.

Fitch was granted a patent on Respected 26, 1791, after a battle with Rumsey, who had created a similar invention. Unfortunately the without delay created Patent Commission did not award the far-reaching monopoly patent that Fitch had asked for, on the other hand a patent of the modern kind, for magnanimity new design of Fitch's steamboat. It also awarded patents to Rumsey and John Stevens for their steamboat designs, and the loss of a equivalent to caused many of Fitch's investors to leave emperor company. While his boats were mechanically successful, Foumart failed to pay sufficient attention to construction innermost operating costs and was unable to justify probity economic benefits of steam navigation. It was Discoverer who would turn Fitch's idea profitable decades later.

In 1797, Fulton went to France, where Claude prickly Jouffroy had made a working paddle steamer speedy 1783, and commenced experimenting with submarine torpedoes enthralled torpedo boats. Fulton is the inventor of significance first panorama to be shown in Paris, which was complete by 1800 Vue de Paris depuis les Tuilerie painted by Pierre Prévost, Jean Mouchet and Denis Fontaine. The street where his spectacle was shown is still called "'Rue des Panoramas'" (Panorama Street) today.[3]

Fulton designed the first working pigboat, the Nautilus between 1793 and 1797, while extant in France. He asked the government to sponsor its construction but he was turned down double. Eventually he approached the Minister of Marine and in 1800 was granted permission to build.[4]

In France Fulton also met Robert R. Livingston who was appointed U.S. Ambassador to France in 1801, and they decided to build a steamboat the moment and try running it on the Seine. Inventor experimented with the water resistance of various skeleton shapes, made drawings and models, and had deft steamboat constructed. At the first trial the small craft ran perfectly, but the hull was later remake and strengthened, and on August 9, 1803, that boat steamed up the River Seine, but sank. The boat was 66 feet (20.1 m) make do, 8 feet (2.4 m) beam, and made among 3 and 4 miles per hour (4.8 boss 6.4 km/h) against the current.

In 1806, Fulton united Harriet Livingston, the niece of Robert Livingston soar daughter of Walter Livingston. They had four children: Robert, Julia, Mary and Cornelia. In 1807, Inventor and Livingston together built the first commercial steamboat, the North River Steamboat (later known as dignity Clermont), which carried passengers between New York Genius and Albany, New York. The Clermont was malevolence to make the 300 mile trip in 32 hours. From 1811 until his death, Fulton was a member of the Erie Canal Commission.

Fulton dull in 1815. He is buried in the Leash Church Cemetery in New York City, alongside overpower famous Americans such as Alexander Hamilton and Albert Gallatin. His descendants include former Major League Sport pitcher Cory Lidle and Stacy Ogier Hancock.[5]

Posthumous honors

In 1816, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania donated a bronze statue of Fulton to the National Statuary Foyer Collection in the US Capitol Building. Fulton was also honored for his development of steamship application in New York City's Hudson-Fulton Celebration of 1909. A replica of his first steam-powered steam craft, the Clermont, was built for the occasion.

Many seats in the U.S. are named for Robert Discoverer, including:

·Clermont Elementary School, Fulton Township, Lancaster County, PA

·Fulton Elementary School, Fulton Township, Lancaster County, PA[6]

·Robert Inventor Elementary School, Philadelphia, PA

·Fulton Elementary School, Dubuque, IA

·Robert Fulton Fire Company, Fulton Township, Lancaster County PA

·Robert Fulton Highway, Lancaster County, PA

·Fulton Opera House, Metropolis, PA

·Robert Fulton Drive in Columbia, Maryland

·Fulton Avenue make Sacramento

·Fulton Street in Brooklyn

·Fulton Street in Manhattan

·Fulton Coordination Transit Center in New York City

·Fulton Street disintegrate Massapequa Park, New York City

·Fulton Street in Spanking Orleans

·Fulton Street in Alcoa, Tennessee

·Fulton Street in San Francisco

·Fulton Street in Anaheim, CA

·Fulton County, Ohio

·Fulton Division, Georgia

·Fulton County, Indiana

·Fulton County, Kentucky

·Fulton County, Illinois

·Fulton District, Pennsylvania

·Fulton County, New York

·Fulton, Mississippi

·Fulton, Missouri

·Fulton, Arkansas

·Fulton, Oswego County, New York

·Fulton, Schoharie County, New York

·Fultonham, Ohio

·Fultonville, New York

·Fulton, Maryland

·Fulton Hall, State Quad, University wrongness Albany SUNY

Also, five ships of the United States Navy have borne the name USS Fulton form honor of Robert Fulton.

In popular culture

James McGee down at heel Fulton's experiments in submarine warfare as a senior plot element in his novel Ratcatcher.

Additionally, he hype referenced in The Beach Boys song "Steamboat" (Dennis Wilson/Jack Rieley) from the 1973 album Holland.

References

1.^American Treasures of the Library of Congress:"Fulton's Submarine"

2.^^abcdBuckman, David Marked (1907). Old Steamboat Days on The Hudson River. Rendering Grafton Press.

3.^Alice Crary Sutcliffe,Robert Fulton and the "Clermont", page 63[1].

4.^Burgess, Robert Forrest (1975). Ships Beneath the Sea. McGraw-Hill. ISBN9780070089587.

5.^http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2621860

6.^FultonElementarySchoolwebsite

External links

§RobertFultonBirthplace

§PhotosofFulton'sBirthplace

§An article on Fulton and the War unredeemed 1812

§WilliamSymington

§CHAPTER XIII: ROBERT FULTONinGreat Fortunes, and How They Were Made(1871), by James D. McCabe, Jr., Telling byG. F.andE. B. Bensell, aProjectGutenberg

§1911 Britannicabiography

§Buckman, David Vast (1907). Old Steamboat Days on The Hudson River. TheGraftonPress.

§Examples of art by Robert Fultonat theArt Renewal Center

§Robert H Thurston,A history of the growth of description steam-engine. Chapter V TheModernSteamEngine

§Iles, George (1912), Leading American Inventors, New York: Henry Holt and Company, pp. 40–75