Читать книгу Lighthouses - Peter Williams - Страница 10

Most books written about lighthouses dwell on how they were built and skim over the main reason for their existence – the light they produced. This is why the names Stevenson, Smeaton and Douglass are better known than Fresnel, Chance and Brewster among the general public. The first three were principally civil engineers whose work is very visible in the structures they erected in prominent parts of Great Britain. Their heroic status is deserved for the incredible feats of engineering they undertook, which stand out as lasting monuments of engineering accomplishment. The other three, by contrast, spent their time in the workshop and laboratory, not on wind-blasted headlands directing building crews against the worst the elements could throw at them. All three were optical scientists (one, James Chance, was an accomplished engineer as well) whose work, ironically because of its focus on light and vision, was less obviously visible and comprehensible to the untrained eye. But this does not mean their contribution to lighthouses was any less significant than the first three honourable gentlemen. The lighthouse lens with which these men are indelibly associated was the fundamental illuminating technology for more than 150 years, even when the candlepower of burners increased with each successive generation of technology. This book shifts the emphasis from construction to illumination, and looks at how the light from a lighthouse was produced and magnified, and how lighthouses proliferated on a gigantic scale in the second half of the 19th century.

Lighthouses have always fascinated people for their often incredible feats of engineering and construction, the romance of their association with shipwrecks, disaster and feats of heroism, the loneliness and dedication of the lighthouse keepers, and the beauty of their locations, which have inspired countless paintings and photographs. But there are parallel stories of equal interest and importance, hitherto neglected by writers and historians, in which other heroes and villains come to light and make their mark. How the English lighthouse authorities were embarrassed into action by their Scottish and French counterparts, which employed both better scientific minds and more advanced technology to protect life and property at sea. How lighthouses became the backbone of a global network that facilitated trade, just as the telegraph facilitated the transfer of information. Together, the lighthouse and the telegraph were the fibre-optic cable and satellite networks of today. And, in a world where the physical movement of goods and people was the first driver of 19th-century globalization, their efficient and safe transport was imperative. The lighthouse was an indispensable technology of 19th-century imperialism, and this book attempts to uncover how this came to be, through the contribution of a few great minds and James Chance in particular.