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Benjamin Hick (1 August 1790 – 9 September 1842) was an English civil and mechanical engineer, art collector and patron; his improvements to the steam engine and invention of scientific tools were held in high esteem by the engineering profession,〔 some of Hick's improvements became public property without claiming the patent rights he was entitled to.〔 He was born at Huddersfield, and christened in the Independent chapel at Highfield, his parents moving shortly afterwards to Leeds where he was educated. Hick's aptitude for mechanics and passion for drawing led to an apprentiship in 1804 (age 14) as a draughtsman with Fenton, Murray and Wood〔 at the Round Foundry in Holbeck. The company made steam engines, textile and other machinery; here he was entrusted with the installation of several large steam engines〔 and offered a partnership when his apprenticeship expired.〔 The offer was declined and Hick moved instead to Bolton in 1810 to work for Smalley, Thwaites and Company〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Benjamin_Hick )〕 as manager〔 of Rothwell's Union Foundry on Blackhorse Street.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/File:Im1814Wardle-Bolt-Iron.jpg )〕 His brother John also trained as an engineer and worked at the Bowling Iron Works near Bradford.〔Chrimes〕 In July 1820 Hick joined other leading industrialists Isaac Dobson, Thomas Hardcastle and Peter Rothwell together with engineer Joshua Routledge to form the Bolton Gaslight and Coke Company, providing gas for public buildings, street lamps and industrial lighting. With the inevitable fire risk of naked flame, the Great Bolton Trustees and a number of mill owners bought horse-drawn fire engines; Hick became a Trustee of Great Bolton during the early 1820s, he was an Anglican and prominent member of Bolton's Pitt Club (formed 1809), that helped him move amongst the middle class social elite of the time. The Dobsons (Isaac and Benjamin), Hick, Rothwell, John Kennedy and others were members of the Black Horse "prosecution" Club (formed 1801), an informal business club meeting at the Black Horse pub in Bolton, that in 1824 secured an annuity for the inventor and fellow member Samuel Crompton, who also frequented the pub. Hick joined the Institute of Civil Engineers in the same year,〔 proposed by Joshua Field, Joseph Farey and James Jones. Along with many other leading figures from the Bolton area Hick was a promoter and with Peter Rothwell an original shareholder of the Bolton and Leigh Railway that opened 1 August 1828 with the naming of the locomotive ''Lancashire Witch'' by Mrs Hulton, wife of the vilified William Hulton JP, High Sheriff of Lancashire and collier. Robert Stephenson was driver of the engine he designed and built with chief engineer George Stephenson, who was a passenger with the other guests.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://daubhill.webeden.co.uk/#/1824-the-railway/4565790886 )〕 Following the occasion that gathered crowds of 40-50 thousand people, in October 1828, Hick and Rothwell received Robert Peel, then home secretary, as a guest at their foundry. In 1837 Hick was, among other local figures including Thomas Ridgway (1778–1839), Edward Bolling, John Hargreaves elder (1780–1860) and Jr, a member of the Provisional Committee of the Bolton and Preston Railway. By 1841 Hick was Deputy chairman and a Director with chairman John Hargreaves; the two families (Hick and Hargreaves) were linked by marriage in 1836. Chief engineer was John Urpeth Rastrick and resident engineer Alexander James Adie, son of Alexander Adie inventor of the sympiesometer. The line opened 22 June 1843 after Hick's death, following some problems in its construction, and merged with the North Union Railway Company 10 May 1844. Hick's executorial trustee, solicitor and banker Thomas Lever Rushton (1810–1883), by then a director of the railway, was part of the negotiating committee for the merger. ==Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell== By 1821 Hick was ''managing partner'' of the Union Foundry, that later became Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell.〔 After Peter Rothwell's death on 2 August 1824, the company continued with Peter Rothwell Jr (1792–1849) as Rothwell, Hick & Co.〔Marshall〕 They made stationary steam engines, (a number of which were featured by John Farey, Jr. in the second volume of his ''Treatise on the Steam Engine'', 1827) as well as general engineering products including cast iron dockyard cranes.〔 Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell were listed in Baines' directory as supplying steam engines, hydraulic presses, weighing machines, gas light apparatus, mill machinery, sugar mills and constructors of fire proof buildings. In 1824 when the prodigious and forward looking Swiss engineer Johann Georg Bodmer (anglicised to John George Bodmer) developed his patterns and textile machinery near Bolton he made use of the Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell workshops.〔 Here in the late 1820s with the co-operation of an Italian merchant, Philip Novelli and H. & E. Ashworth, (Henry (1794–1880) and Edmund (1800–1881) Ashworth), they began a project of advanced concept at Egerton Mill to include a spectacular waterwheel of 62 feet diameter by 12 feet wide and 110–140 horsepower, completed by Fairbairn and Lillie when Bodmer returned to Europe as a result of ill-health. To aid in the construction it is claimed that Bodmer devised the ''travelling crane''; the Egerton wheel became a tourist destination during the 1830s and 1840s, it was one of the largest in the United Kingdom attracting visits from industrialists and politicians.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://egertonvillage.medianewsonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=7 )〕 Benjamin Disraeli was a visitor to the Ashworth mills in 1843. By the 1830s Hick had become a ''highly valued friend'' of Bodmer, on one occasion arbitrating a patent dispute. Hick also formed a close friendship with engineer and artist James Nasmyth, in his autobiography Nasmyth refers to Hick as a ''most admirable man... whose judgment in all matters connected with engineering and mechanical construction was held in the very highest regard... ingenious'', Hick ''contrived and constructed... one of the most powerful hydraulic presses'' in existence. According to Nasmyth, Hick and William Fairbairn were among the most ''intelligent and cultivated persons in Lancashire''. Hick was an accomplished draughtsman and it is stated that he ''introduced almost a new era'' of elegance and design for the ''exterior forms'' of steam engines and larger works. Hick and Rothwell built their first locomotive ''Union'' in 1830 for the Bolton and Leigh Railway, they also built ''Pioneer'' for the Petersburg Railroad in America and a 2-2-0, ''the Pontchartrain'' for the Pontchartrain Railroad, New Orleans in 1832. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Benjamin Hick」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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