PEOPLE KNOWN FOR: ship construction
British engineer
Isambard Kingdom Brunel was a British civil and mechanical engineer of great originality who designed the first transatlantic steamer. The only son of the engineer and inventor Sir Marc Isambard Brunel,...
English navigator
William Adams was a navigator, merchant-adventurer, and the first Englishman to visit Japan. At the age of 12 Adams was apprenticed to a shipbuilder in the merchant marine, and in 1588 he was master of...
Irish ship designer
Thomas Andrews was an Irish shipbuilder who was best known for designing the luxury liners Olympic and Titanic. Andrews was born into a prominent family; his brother John later became prime minister of...
American inventor and lawyer
John Stevens was an American lawyer, inventor, and promoter of the development of steam power for transportation. His petition to the U.S. Congress resulted in the Patent Law of 1790, the foundation of...
American industrialist
Thomas Augustus Watson was an American telephone pioneer and shipbuilder, one of the original organizers of the Bell Telephone Company, who later turned to shipbuilding and constructed a number of vessels...
Canadian shipwright
William James Pirrie, Viscount Pirrie was an Irish shipbuilder who controlled Harland and Wolff, the largest ship-construction firm in the world and the builder of the passenger liner Titanic. Pirrie was...
American architect and engineer
William Francis Gibbs was a naval architect and marine engineer who directed the mass production of U.S. cargo ships during World War II, designed the famous, standardized cargo-carrying Liberty ships,...
American industrialist
Henry J. Kaiser was an American industrialist and founder of more than 100 companies including Kaiser Aluminum, Kaiser Steel, and Kaiser Cement and Gypsum. In 1913 Kaiser was working for a gravel and cement...
American industrialist
John Fitch was a pioneer of American steamboat transportation who produced serviceable steamboats before Robert Fulton. Fitch served in the American Revolution (1775–83) and later surveyed land along the...
United States naval engineer
B. F. Isherwood was a U.S. naval engineer who, during the American Civil War, greatly augmented the U.S. Navy’s steam-powered fleet. The son of a physician, Isherwood attended Albany (N.Y.) Academy (1831–36)...
French industrialist
Eugène Schneider was one of the great industrialists of the 19th century and a prominent figure in French politics. Schneider lost his father when quite young and, left penniless, started working in the...
king of Portugal
Dinis was the sixth king of Portugal (1279–1325), who strengthened the kingdom by improving the economy and reducing the power of the nobility and the church. The son of Afonso III, Dinis was educated...
Canadian industrialist
Kenneth Colin Irving was a Canadian industrialist whose vast business empire dominated the province of New Brunswick, where he employed 1 out of every 12 workers. Irving was born in a small fishing village...
British engineer
William Fairbairn was a Scottish civil engineer and inventor who did pioneering work in bridge design and in testing iron and finding new applications for it. From 1817 to 1832 he was a millwright at Manchester,...
American engineer
Robert Livingston Stevens was a U.S. engineer and ship designer who invented the widely used inverted-T railroad rail and the railroad spike. He tested the first steamboat to use screw propellers, built...
American naval architect
Donald McKay was a Canadian-born naval architect and builder of the largest and fastest of the clipper ships. After emigrating to New York City in 1827, he worked as an apprentice to the ship carpenter...
British engineer
William Symington was a British engineer who developed (1801) a successful steam-driven paddle wheel and used it the following year to propel one of the first practical steamboats, the Charlotte Dundas....
American naval architect
John Willis Griffiths was an American naval architect who created the first extreme clipper ship, the Rainbow, which was designed to engage in the China trade. The Rainbow was launched in 1845 and began...
American ship designer
Joshua Humphreys was an American shipbuilder and naval architect who designed the U.S. frigate Constitution, familiarly known as “Old Ironsides” (launched Oct. 21, 1797). Humphreys was commissioned in...
French engineer and inventor
Claude-François-Dorothée, marquis de Jouffroy d’Abbans was a French engineer and inventor who in 1783 traveled upstream on the Saône River near Lyon in his Pyroscaphe, the first really successful steamboat....
British architect and engineer
Sir John Isaac Thornycroft was an English naval architect and engineer who made fundamental improvements in the design and machinery of torpedo boats and built the first torpedo boat for the Royal Navy....
British engineer
John Scott Russell was a British civil engineer best known for researches in ship design. He designed the first seagoing battleship built entirely of iron. A graduate of the University of Glasgow (at age...
Scottish engineer
Henry Bell was a Scottish engineer who launched the first commercially successful steamship in Europe. After serving apprenticeships as a millwright and a ship modeler, he went to London, where he worked...
American naval architect
William Henry Webb was an American naval architect, one of the most versatile and successful shipbuilders of his day, who in 1889 established and endowed the Webb Institute of Naval Architecture at Glen...
United States admiral
Howard Leroy Vickery was a U.S. naval officer and an outstanding merchant shipbuilder of World War II. Vickery graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md., in 1915 and became assistant to the...
Swedish ship owner
Axel Ludvig Brostrom was the founder of what was, in its time, the largest shipping group in Sweden. Brostrom is regarded as the father of the modern Swedish mercantile marine. As a young man, Brostrom...