GREAT AMERICAN INVENTORS
Robert Fulton
TWO
Robert Fulton was not the inventor of the steamboat. He was, however, the first man to apply the power of the steam engine to the propulsion of boats in a practical and effective manner. Born of poor parents at Little Britain, now Fulton, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, in 1765, he received only the scantiest education; but early showed promise of becoming an excellent artist. At the age of seventeen he took up painting seriously, and supported himself thus in Philadelphia until he was twenty-one.
Then he bought a farm in Washington County; but soon after was strongly advised to go to England for the purpose of studying art under the American, Benjamin West. There he met Earl Stanhope, Duke of Bridgewater, who interested him in engineering. In 1794 he took out an English patent for superseding canal locks by inclined planes. He also invented about this time a new method for sawing marble, a machine for spinning flax, and another for making ropes.
Soon after this he went to Paris, and built a submarine, the Nautilus. This boat was tried in Brest Harbor in 1801, before a commission appointed by Napoleon Bonaparte, and Fulton succeeded in blowing up a small vessel anchored there for that purpose. Two years later, at Paris, he was also successful in propelling a boat by steam power.
Fulton returned to America, and in partnership with Robert Livingston constructed the first American steamboat, the Clermont. This was launched in the spring of 1807, and its success caused a great sensation. The principle of propelling boats by steam was now proved. The Clermont was soon established as a regular passenger boat between New York and Albany.
Fulton built the Demologos, or Fulton the First, for the United States government during the years 1814 and 1815. This was the first steam battleship ever constructed.
In February, 1815, the inventor caught cold from exposure and rapidly became worse. On February 24 he died, mourned by everyone who had known the man and his achievements.
PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 1, No. 29, SERIAL No. 29