USA > Pennsylvania > Encyclopedia of Pennsylvania biography : illustrated, Volume I > Part 3
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constructed to parallel the Pennsylvania. The great Carnegie interests were pro- tecting themselves at every point-mills were planned to compete in lines they had hitherto left to their rivals; when lo! overnight as it were, arose the United States Steel Corporation, successor by purchase to every mill, furnace, bloomery, oven, mine, rail, locomotive and ship, hitherto owned by the many companies owned or controlled by Mr. Carnegie and his thirty partners. Peace came to the threatened steel industry; the Pennsyl- vania Southern was never completed, and Andrew Carnegie stepped from his proud position as the world's greatest iron mas- ter and constructive genius. The price paid him was fabulous; each of the trusted "thirty" retired, enriched many times beyond their wildest imaginings, while the great master was hundreds of times a millionaire. The greatest fortune of modern times was his, and from that moment began the second phase of this most wonderful life. Fifty-three years had elapsed since the penniless boy landed in a strange land. He was sixty- six years of age, and the problem now facing him was how to make good his own statement that "it is a crime for a man to die rich." As this article has made no attempt to give in detail the many ways in which this fortune was made, so there will be no attempt to give in detail the way it has been disposed of.
Mr. Carnegie had given generously for many years, principally to institutions in the Pittsburgh district, a locality which he will always regard with love and affec- tion. He now began that wonderful career of world-wide philanthropy that has never been equalled, knowing no sect, creed or nationality, but giving Pittsburgh first place, the United States second, and then his native land. He has not given at random, but following carefully matured plans; has given al-
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most exclusively along educational lines, but in a manner peculiarly his own. Upon retiring from business the first con- siderable gift Mr. Carnegie made was one of five million dollars to his old em- ployees-four million dollars for pensions and relief, and one million dollars for the endowment of the three institutes, (libra- ries, music halls, workmen's clubs, etc), at Homestead, Braddock and Duquesne. Outside his educational giving in its manifold forms, his most active effort has been to bring about the Peace of Nations, and this position he firmly maintains.
Mention is necessary of his great edu- cational gift to the city of Pittsburgh, commonly known as the "Carnegie In- stitute." This includes a wonderful building located in Schenley Park, cover- ing four acres, and a separate building near by, across a deep ravine, the home of the Carnegie Technical Institute. Un- der the roof of the larger building is a free library of mammoth proportions, a magnificent gallery, a most perfect music hall, with a great organ where every Sun- day afternoon a free organ recital is given ; a hall of architecture and depart- ment of natural history, most wonderful in its scope. Twenty acres of floor space is in use, while the most costly marbles and finest of decorations adorn foyer, halls and stairways. Over the main en- trance is engraved: "This Building, dedicated to Literature, Science and Art, is the gift of Andrew Carnegie to the People of Pittsburgh." Nowhere else can there be found a similar building, containing library, music hall and mu- seum, a school of technology with ca- pacity for three thousand students, and a notable school for young women. One would like to dwell upon the value of this gift to the scientific world, to the young man and woman seeking a techni- cal education ; to the student whose days are spent among its wonders of natural history, architecture and art; to the
school children whose goal it is; to those who so freely draw upon its book treas- ures; and to those who every Sunday listen almost reverently to classic music drawn from the great organ by master hands. But this is impossible; the cost in dollars and cents of his various gifts, including all that have been named as his particular gifts to Pittsburgh, is in ex- cess of thirty-one millions of dollars, and he rejoices in the gift. His total gifts to date exceed three hundred millions.
Lest there be an impression that Mr. Carnegie, in his generosity, gives only enduring monuments of practical educa- tional value, attention must be called to the thousands who draw annually from vast pension funds in both the United States and Great Britain. These consti- tute an army in themselves, one little known, but wonderfully appreciative. One fund created by Mr. Carnegie is world-wide in its operation-The Hero Fund. This is a reward to those display- ing courage in emergencies, whether on sea or land. A fund for this purpose exists in Pittsburgh, embracing the United States and Canada, and others in Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Holland and Belgium. Awards are made annually of medals, cash or educational privileges. A recent newspaper credits Mr. Carnegie with having achieved his purpose, and states that he has disposed of all of his fortune to a corporation which is to con- tinue the operation of his various gifts generation after generation, except such sums as he will distribute by last will and testament. Thus he will not commit the crime of "dying rich."
He married, in 1887, Louise Whitefield, who has been in closest accord with him in all his plans for disposing of his for- tune. Their only child, Margaret, was born in 1897. Their time is divided be- tween a magnificent estate in Scotland, "Skibo Castle," and a pal tial residence
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on Fifth avenue, New York. Honors have been showered upon Mr. Carnegie ; universities have conferred honorary de- grees; France created him a knight of the Legion of Honor; the Sorbonne gave him its medal; Saint Andrews, Aberdeen, and Glasgow Universities elected him Lord Rector. He has gained distinction in the literary world and upon the plat- form. In 1886 he published "Triumph- ant Democracy," which has run through many editions ; this followed his "Around the World" (1884) ; in 1906 appeared his "Gospel of Wealth," followed by the "Empire of Business"; "Life of Watt," in 1906; and "Problems of To-day," in 1909. He has always supported the principles of the Republican party, although he strongly opposed the annexation of the Philippines, following the Spanish War. He has the utmost faith in the future of the English speaking race, in the ultimate abolition of war and the progress of edu- cation along non-sectarian lines. He is a brave man, indeed, who would analyze the character of Mr. Carnegie. He is as "canny a Scot" as e'er drew breath; as shrewd a Yankee as the sun of New Eng- land e'er shone upon ; as big hearted and happy as an Irishman; as stubborn as an Englishman; yet, withal, a man that, take him all in all, stands alone in the magni- tude of his achievement. Wallace Bruce, the Scotch-American poet, after a visit to the Carnegie Institute in 1896, wrote the following poem, presenting a copy to Mr. Carnegie and one to the Library :
You have wrought a noble poem In your home of early years, Aye, a proud prophetic poem In the land of peerless peers. Cold the lines that fall and falter Since the bard of Colla passed Fruitless offerings on life's altar, But your work abideth fast. Oh! to wake the coming ages, Idle wish of many a seer,
Dead the tome of weary sages, But your note shall linger clear.
Hark, beneath yon swelling arches, Knowledge, skill and hope enchime, As the long procession marches To the grandest song of time.
SHAW, Thomas, of Shawmont, Scientist, Inventor.
If ever there was a citizen of Pennsyl- vania whose form might well be cast in deathless bronze, it is the late Thomas Shaw, inventor, scientist and mechanical engineer. There is scarcely a civilized country in the whole world that is not indebted to the genius of this man whose inventions cover almost every phase of applied mechanics, and have provided la- bor and life-saving devices that have been of incalculable value. He was the inven- tor of the mercury steam gauge, the standard of pressure of the world; the noiseless steam exhaust, which muffles the sound of escaping steam, and which is used universally on all locomotives and steamships. One of his simplest but most useful inventions was the Verona lock nut washer, commonly known as the spring pawl washer, in use on railroads, which goes between the nut and the fish plate for holding the rails in place, and to Mr. Shaw and this device humanity is indebted for safety in railroad travel all over the world. Altogether Mr. Shaw was granted 186 patents by the United States government, while there were many other inventions not patented, be- cause of his untimely death, which doubt- less would have made his name even more famous than it is. It is with pe- euliar interest then that we note some- what in detail the career of this great man.
Mr. Shaw was born in Philadelphia, May 5, 1838, son of James and Catherine (Snyder) Shaw, who were of English, French and German descent. The Shaws come from a long and distin- guished line of Colonial ancestry closely
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associated with the settlement of the The courage and ingenuity of his mother State of Pennsylvania and the city of appealed strongly to the manliness in the boy, and he helped her all that lay in his power. Mr. Shaw was not proud of his school record. He was repeatedly a run- away from school, declaring that he found it impossible to study when the teacher wanted him to, and, strange as it may seem he was frequently found in his home poring over his school books and trying to solve problems in higher mathematics in his own way. He knew no such word as fail, he said, and when he could not solve a thing himself, his mother's inge- nuity always found a way. He was often seen at midnight studying from the very books that he had rejected at school. So successful was Mr. Shaw in thus laying the foundation for his great mental achievements in after life, that he became strongly opposed to the public school sys- tems that disregard the individuality of the child and force all children to pass through the same system of training. Thus his mother did not force him to at- tend a school and submit to a system which was distasteful to him, but devoted her own splendid efforts to developing the ingenuity and inventive tendencies of her son, which were evident as a boy, and he tenderly provided for her up to the day of her death in 1876. Philadelphia. The earliest of these set- tled in Pennsylvania prior to 1694, purchasing a large tract of land in that year. Mr. Shaw's great-great-great grandfather, James Shaw, and his eight sons, fought in the War of the Rev- olution, as did also his great-great- great-grandfather, John Peter Michelet, and his great-great-grandfather, Andrew Snyder. Thomas Brown, another ances- tor, born in Barking, Essex county, Eng- land, in 1866, who came to Pennsylvania in 1682 with William Penn, was one of the most famous preachers of that time, record of which is to be found in "Scharf and Westcott's History of Philadelphia." On the maternal side Mr. Shaw is de- scended from the celebrated Michelet family that dates back to the time of the Frankish King Choldwig, A. D. 536, when Michelet was treasurer to that King. A descendant of this Michelet was major domo to King Charles the Bold, and mar- ried Beatrice de Anjou, princess of the royal blood and sister to the King of France. This family is also renowned through one of its descendants, Carl Lud- wig Michelet, Professor of Philosophy in the University of Berlin ; Jules de Michel- et, French historian, and in America by John Jacob Michelet (Mickley), who saved the Liberty Bell from the British in 1777. It is believed that Mr. Shaw in- herited his philosophical turn of mind from this family, but more directly from his mother, who was a woman possessed of inventive genius and of much firmness of character. In her home were many original devices invented and made by herself.
The boyhood of Mr. Shaw was quite eventful. To begin with, his father had invested in coal lands, and the venture proved a failure, and it was to his strug- gles during this period that Mr. Shaw attributed his great success in after life.
As early as eight years of age Mr. Shaw displayed a decided mechanical genius. He made a number of beautiful models of various kinds. At the age of ten, with the aid of his mother, he built a retort in the cellar of his home for melting old glass bottles. From the molten glass he made many useful and pretty objects. At the age of twelve he invented and con- structed his first complete machine, for holding and unwinding hanks of wool. It was operated by a treadle and so con- structed that it measured off each yard of wool as it was being used. The ma- chine was especially constructed to re- lieve the boy of the necessity for holding
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the yarn, which his mother preferred to have him do to the exclusion of the other children, and often when he wanted to play he was busy holding the wool for his mother. Mr. Shaw said that the supreme moment of his life was when he peeped in at the window and saw his mother con- tentedly seated before the machine which was reeling off yarn with perfect regu- larity. At fifteen years of age he wrote an article on bridge construction that was published in a mechanical paper of that period. Mr. Shaw stated in after life he discovered no way of improving upon that plan of building bridges. While still a boy he astonished the staid Quaker rela- tives by his philosophy, knowledge and wit, and they shook their heads gravely over the boy, advising the mother to de- vote special care to the shaping of his character. He associated with boys and men much older than himself. Men liked his company because of his originality and because of his value to them in re- pairing broken looms, machinery, etc. Mr. Shaw's first patent was on a gas me- ter and it was issued to him when still in his nineteenth year. The invention was made when he was but 17 years old, but owing to his inexperience and lack of funds it was impossible to secure his pat- ent carlier. He claimed to be the first in- ventor of the rotary shears, but was pre- vented from doing anything with it by a fatherly ok neighbor, who discouraged him but who sold the idea for a round sum himself. He was continually surrounded by crafty individuals who endeavored to rob him of his ideas for their own profit, and this made him determined to trust the work of a new invention to no one outside his own family. His wife did this work for him until his daughter, Cora, now Mrs. Joseph Robert Wilson, relieved her mother of the labor at the early age of fourteen. In this way Mr. Shaw was relieved of much of the unnecessary labor of preparing the specifications and felt no
anxiety of his ideas being conveyed to the outside world before the patent was ob- tained. Mr. Shaw was superintendent of the Midvale Steel Works from its incep- tion. These Works, at first called the Butcher Steel Works, were founded in 1867 and reorganized in 1871 by J. How- ard Mitchell and Philip S. Justice, as the Midvale plant. Mr. Shaw was associated with these men in the manufacture of his own inventions, but later on went into business for himself. His inventive geni- us and skill, however, were relied upon to introduce many innovations in the Butch- er Steel Plant. He was placed in charge of the Works that produced steel tires of a quality equal to those manufactured in England, and as all tires used in America at that time were imported he had the honor of turning out the first steel tires rolled in this country. The Butcher Steel Works produced much of the material for the Eads bridge constructed over the Mississippi at St. Louis. Mr. Shaw was in charge of this work, which resulted in a close friendship between the inventor and Captain Eads. This relation was most confidential and he stood in this ca- pacity to a large number of noted men, notably William Weightman, Franklin B. Gowan and Chief Engineer W. W. Wood, of the United States Navy.
By many his work has been regarded as the result of inspiration. When in- venting, it was his habit to lock himself in his laboratory at his home, where he could be seen sitting motionless perhaps for hours, when, as if upon the instant the problem was solved, he rapidly sketched out his plan of invention, rarely, if ever, making any mechanical changes after- ward. His daughter, who was his de- voted companion for years and spent a great deal of her time in the laboratory with her father, attests to this fact, that if interrupted during this period of deep thought, he was so disturbed that he would put the work away from him, man-
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ifesting great anger at the interruption. Mr. Shaw was always engaged in serious work. His mother said that there seemed to be very little time as a boy when he played. He had little time for playthings and used only the tools that men work with. He seemed to understand in some mysterious way in early life the great power of dynamic forces and the chemis- try of things that surrounded him.
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His business was established in 1860 as inventor, manufacturer of tools, ma- chinery, engineers' special appliances, steam and hydraulic machinery, United States standard mercury pressure gauges, noise quieting nozzles, steam mufflers for locomotives, steamships, cotton presses, etc., hydraulic and friction buffers, gov- ernors for pumping engines, etc. Mr. Shaw's business was made up entirely of his own inventions, and many of his de- vices were adopted by the different gov- ernments of the world and by the United States and State governments as official standards. Mr. Shaw was also the inven- tor of gunpowder test ganges that tested up to 50,000 pounds pressure to the square inch. A magnificent gauge of this type is in use by the Krupp Works, and has been largely used by other powder and gun manufacturing concerns. One of the most novel of Mr. Shaw's inventions which displayed his ingenuity was the gunpowder pile driver. The originality of this device consisted in the harnessing of gunpowder for peaceful and practical engineering purposes and was the first of its kind in the world. This invention aroused great interest among engineers and met with instant and pronounced suc- cess, working with marked economy and giving high efficiency. By the aid of this pile driver a pile forty feet in length and 14 inches in diameter was forced its en- tire length into the firm ground in one minute of time, and without any injury to the timber and without any banding on the head of the pole before driving.
Crowds of engineers and men interested in public work came to see this truly mar- velous invention. With it Mr. Shaw did most of the government pile-driving work at the United States Naval Station at League Island. A committee of eminent engineers, duly appointed for the purpose of making a report on the Shaw gunpow- der pile driver, pronounced this novel ap- plication of gunpowder to be an un- equaled success for the purpose of driv- ing piles. This was signed by W. W. Wood, Chief Engineer of the United States Navy, and by other eminent engi- neers. The pile driver was exhibited at the Fair of the American Institute in New York in November of 1870, and it was pronounced to be an invention entirely new to science and mechanics and was awarded a medal of honor. The Frank- lin Institute of the City of Philadelphia awarded the Scott Legacy Medal for this invention. It was also awarded a medal at the International Centennial Exposi- tion of 1876. The Shaw compound pro- pellor pump was one of the most impor- tant of his inventions, coming as it did at a time when pumping machinery was totally inadequate to the demands made upon it. This pump excited great inter- est when exhibited in New York, dis- charging, as it did, 12,000 gallons per minute. This pump was pressed into service in St. Louis during a heavy flood, winning great fame for itself by the rapid manner in which it pumped out shafts, etc. It was frequently used in mines where flooding occurred.
Mr. Shaw regarded his method of low- ering boats at sea and releasing them as among the most valuable of his life-sav- ing devices.
On February 21, 1877, the committee of Science and Arts of the Franklin In- stitute made a report on "Shaw's Spiral Exhaust Nozzle," and stated "in our opinion, Mr. Shaw has done a great serv- ice to the country, and particularly to the
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transportation interests, in overcoming the obnoxious and dangerous feature in the use of steam," and they recommended the award to Mr. Shaw of the Scott Leg- acy Premium and Medal for his "Spiral Exhaust Nozzle." This nozzle was en- dorsed and its use recommended by the Board of Supervising Inspectors of Steam Vessels, by owners and captains of boats, engineers in the navy and the boats of the American Line of steamships. Since that time this invention has come into world- wide use. This invention alone should have brought millions to Mr. Shaw, but he died a poor man, having spent his enormous fortune in the development of his many and varied inventions. Mr. Shaw considered that the United States government was not paternal enough in protecting its inventors by lengthening the life of a patent. He stated that the least cost at which an invention of any magnitude could be brought out and in- troduced was $10,000, and he frequently spent in experiments and the development of an invention from $100,000 to $150,000, and in point of time he stated that ten years at least is required to bring an in- vention before the public to a point where it becomes remunerative and thereafter remains only seven years to regain what had been spent in developments and to enjoy a profit. The writer of a novel is protected by the government for forty years, but the inventor of a life-saving device or a machine that is of inestimable commercial value to the world at large is allowed only seventeen years in which to reimburse himself for moneys expend- ed and to reap a profit from hard labor. This, stated Mr. Shaw, is the reason why inventors die poor. Were Mr. Shaw liv- ing today he could make the proud boast that there is not a shop, steamboat or railroad in the world that does not in some way or another use one of his in- ventions or improvements in some capaci- ty, and yet Mr. Shaw, after spending the
greater portion of his life in giving to the world devices that immeasurably add- ed to the safety and comfort of the public, died a poor man, and in a great measure his ill health was due in the latter days of his life to the disappointment he felt in his failure to convince the government that this great injustice to the inventors, who had helped to make this nation com- mercially what it was, needed remedying. Mr. Shaw's early business career was not carried on under the fostering care of wealth, influence or position. It was started at the bottom rung of the ladder, after his father's failure in the coal min- ing business, and he had to climb the lad- der unassisted, save only by the splendid courage of his mother. Mr. Shaw's pro- fessional services, when he was finally es- tablished, were in such demand that his office door was kept locked and rarely could anyone be admitted. He was fin- ally obliged, in order to protect himself, to charge a professional fee of $500 per hour. This was to eliminate that class of men who brought uncompleted inven- tions to him to have them perfected at no cost to themselves and at great loss to Mr. Shaw in time and energy. Many a struggling mechanic, however, in whom Mr. Shaw recognized genius, was placed upon his feet, educated and trained by Mr. Shaw, and it was his proud boast that not a few machine shops in the city of Philadelphia were founded and run by men trained by himself. His apprentices were always in great demand and with but very few exceptions turned out to be successful engineers and practical busi- ness men.
Perhaps the most remarkable of all Mr. Shaw's inventions was his device for de- tecting the presence of noxious gases in mines. In 1890 the Ohio Institute of Mining Engineers invited Mr. Shaw to present to them this system of detecting, measuring and removing dangerous and poisonous gases in mines, as they wished
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to examine the invention, the first of its kind in the history of mining engineering to subject gases to instrumental control. A delegation of the United Mine Work- ers of America who were present and heard Mr. Shaw's lecture on his wholly new and practical method of preventing explosions in mines, assembled the fol- lowing day in convention and passed resolutions endorsing the appliance and recommended its introduction and use in all mines. Mr. Shaw was the first man in the world to invent and construct a machine that reveals the line of demar- cation between the ignitable line and the non-ignitable line of gases and he deter- mined this to within the one-thousandth part of one per cent. A new difficulty arose here in the construction of the gas- guns, for the bore had to be accurately constructed, and, no machine for that purpose being in existence, it became necessary for Mr. Shaw to construct ma- chinery to build these gas-testing de- vices, so that every machine would measure just as exactly as another. The enormous cost of these experiments with machinery cannot be estimated. It was this latest invention of Mr. Shaw's that was the prime cause of his nervous breakdown. The scales of the percent- age of gases were marked upon a gradu- ated scale beam or bar, and Mr. Shaw was the first man in the world to have created such a graduated scale for ex- plosive gases. This device was adopted as the official standard of the States of Pennsylvania and Ohio. Mr. Shaw was awarded the two highest medals granted by the Franklin Institute of Phil- adelphia; one an Elliott Crescent Gold Medal and two Scott Legacy Medals.
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