Moses G. Farmer
Encyclopedia : M : MO : MOS : Moses G. Farmer
Moses Gerrish Farmer (February 2, 1820 - May 2, 1893) was an electrical engineer and inventor. Farmer was a member to the AIEE, later known as the IEEE.
He was born at Boscawen, New Hampshire. He received his schooling at Philips Academy and Dartmouth College. He was a pioneer telegraph operator. He constructed and maintained the telegraph lines of Massachusetts. He later became a superintendent of a telegraph company. Farmer investigated multiple telegraphy. He successfully demonstrated duplex telegraphy between New York and Philadelphia in 1856 (Conot, p29). Farmer also investigated telluric currents. In 1847, Farmer developed an electric train. Farmer later fabricated a process for electroplating aluminum. At Boston in 1851, he constructed a electric fire-alarm service. He invented several forms of the incandescent electric light. He built a platinum filament incandescent light in 1859 (Conot, p120). He was a co-inventor of the self-exciting dynamo, an electric generator using electromagnets for the field which are energized by the generator output, in 1866 (Derry & Williams, p614). In 1868, with the Farmer dynamo, Farmer lit a house in Massachusetts. He also patented an early lightbulb (which was later bought by Thomas Edison). With his partner William Wallace, he invented the an early dynamo which powered a system of arc lights he exhibited at the Centennial Exhibition of 1876 in Philadelphia, and which inspired Thomas Edison to work on an improved incandescent light. Edison used the Wallace-Farmer 8 horsepower dynamo to power his early electric light demonstrations (Jonnes, p47,54, Josephson 176-186). Farmer served as a teacher for a time. Farmer died at the World's Columbian Exposition. Farmer was a pioneer of many aspects of 19th century electrical invention, but failed to carry his ideas to commercial success.
References
- "A Streak of Luck," by Robert Conot, Seaview Books, New York, 1979, ISBN 0-87223-521-1
- "A Short History of Technology," by T.K. Derry and Trevor I. Williams, Oxford University Press, New York, 1961
- "Empires of Light," by Jill Jonnes, Random House, New York, 2003, ISBN 0-375-50739-6
- "Edison" by Matthew Josephson. McGraw Hill, New York, 1959, ISBN 07-033046-8
External articles
- Patents
- [U.S. Patent 17,355]
- [U.S. Patent 21,492]
- [U.S. Patent], "Method of Sending And Receiving Messages Simultaneously Over the Same Wire". February 16, 1875.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.