Newsletter for Sunday 15 September

TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY NEWSLETTER - 15 SEPTEMBER

Feature for Today

William Seward Burroughs died on 15 Sep 1898 at the young age of 43. Yet, as an American inventor, he had invented the world's first commercially viable recording adding machine and already pioneered its manufacture. With his first practical adding machine, he provided not only the ability to add numbers accurately, and print out the results. The company he co-founded as the American Arithmometer Co. (1886) later became the Burroughs Corporation (1905) and eventually by merger formed Unisys in the 1980s. The excerpt on The Burroughs Adding Machine from the book The City of Detroit (1922) begins by declaring: “There is no story in American industrial history more absorbing, more replete with human interest, than the story of the inventor of the adding machine and his years of disheartening labor to perfect his creation. ... the creative genius and the struggles of one man, whose name is now perpetuated in the title of the company.”

Book of the Day

On 15 Sep 1859, Isambard K. Brunel died. His staggering accomplishments in engineering are legendary: bridges, tunnels, railways, ships and more. Today's Science Store pick is: Brunel: The Man Who Built the World (Phoenix Press), by Steven Brindle, which is just one of several available biographies. If you know little about Brunel, you will be well rewarded by reading about the ambition and innovation of this amazingly prolific engineer. By the age of 26, he had been appointed chief engineer of the Great Western Railway, linking Bristol to London. His love of steamships led him to build a series of revolutionary vessels, including the Great Britain—the first steamship to cross the Atlantic. Outstandingly illustrated with a wealth of blueprints, drawings, and rare photographs, this biography tracks the life and achievements of this Victorian-era genius, whose staggering feats continue to influence civil engineering today. It is available New from $7.44. Used from $0.01. (As of time of writing.). For picks from earlier newsletters, see the Today in Science Science Store home page.

Quotations for Today
	If the Commission is to enquire into the conditions “to be observed,” it is to be presumed that they will give the result of their enquiries; or, in other words, that they will lay down, or at least suggest, “rules” and “conditions to be (hereafter) observed” in the construction of bridges, or, in other words, embarrass and shackle the progress of improvement to-morrow by recording and registering as law the prejudices or errors of to-day. [Objecting to any interference by the State with the freedom of civil engineers in the conduct of their professional work.] - Isambard Kingdom Brunel, English civil engineer and mechanical engineer (died 15 Sep 1859).
	My colleagues in elementary particle theory in many lands [and I] are driven by the usual insatiable curiosity of the scientist, and our work is a delightful game. I am frequently astonished that it so often results in correct predictions of experimental results. How can it be that writing down a few simple and elegant formulae, like short poems governed by strict rules such as those of the sonnet or the waka, can predict universal regularities of Nature? - Murray Gell-Mann, American theoretical physicist (born 15 Sep 1929).
	Men will not be content to manufacture life: they will want to improve on it. - John Desmond Bernal, Irish physicist and X-ray crystallographer (died 15 Sep 1971).

Quiz
Before you look at today's web page, see if you can answer some of these questions about the events that happened on this day. Some of the names are very familiar. Others will likely stump you. Tickle your curiosity with these questions, then check your answers on today's web page.
Births
	Murray Gell-Mann, born 15 Sep 1929 is an American theoretical physicist who predicted the existance of new subatomic particles, for which he won the 1969 Nobel Prize. What did he call these particles?
	Jan Ernst Matzeliger, born 15 Sep 1852, was a Dutch Guianian-American inventor known for a machine that replaced hand methods of manufacture of a certain product. He received a patent for his invention on 20 Mar 1883. What was his invention?
Deaths
	A German aircraft engineer and designer (1898-1978) during World War 2 supplied the Luftwaffe with its foremost types of combat aircraft. In 1944 he produced the Me262 fighter, the first jet plane flown in combat. Can you name this man?
	William Seward Burroughs (1855-1898) was the American inventor of the first recording adding machine. He was the son of a mechanic, but began in what his father regarded as a “gentleman's” vocation. During his first career, William recognized the need for an adding machine, with the ability to print out the calculation. After seven years in that job, which he found not to his liking, he changed to working at a machine shop. Then he had the opportunity to develop and market his idea. Burrough's first job was in which business that needed an adding machine?
Events
	On 15 Sep 1998, the rings around the planet Jupiter were explained by studies of the rings made by scientists at several institutions. What origin did they suggest for the rings?
	On 15 Sep 1830, the Liverpool to Manchester line opened in England, built by the inventor of the famous Rocket locomotive with which he had won the Rainhill trials of 1829, a competition as to who could build the fastest locomotive. Can you name this inventor?

Answers

When you have your answers ready to all the questions above, you'll find all the information to check them, and more, on the September 15 web page of Today in Science History. Or, try this link first for just the brief answers. Fast answers for the previous newsletter for September 14: nitric oxide • several centimetres • Sir Peter Scott • Georges Leclanch� • Boston • 36 hours.

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