Brindley, James

Brindley, James (1716-72), engineer, b. near Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, England.

James Brindley grew up in a small country village and never went to school.

He started work as a farmer's boy, but, at the age of seventeen, went to work in Macclesfield and there learned about the machinery in the factories driven by water-mills.

At twenty-six, he started his own business at Leek, Staffordshire. He made a name for himself by inventing a water-engine for draining a coal mine and designing an improved silk mill, and the Duke of Bridgewater asked him to build a canal to carry coal 10 miles from his mine at Worsley to Manchester.

The Bridgewater Canal, opened in 1761, was the first industrial canal in England. It contained one remarkable feature, the Barton Aqueduct. Here the canal ran over the River Irwell at a height of 39 feet.

In the years that followed, a network of canals spread over England, and Brindley helped to build many of them. In all, he built 365 miles of canals.

Brindley taught himself to read and write but he could not spell. If he had a problem to solve, he went to bed and thought about it. It is said that on the day water was let into the Bridgewater Canal, Brindley went to bed and stayed there until he heard all was well.

See Samuel Smiles Lives Of The Engineers: Vermuyden, Myddelton, Perry, James Brindley