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Hiram Stevens Maxim
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Hiram Stevens Maxim | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | February 5, 1840 Sangerville, Maine |
| Died | November 24, 1916 London |
| Resting place | West Norwood Cemetery |
| Occupation | Inventor |
| Children | Hiram Percy Maxim |
| Relatives | Hudson Maxim (brother) |
Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim (February 5, 1840 – November 24, 1916) was the inventor of the Maxim Gun in 1881, the first portable, fully automatic machine gun, and the ubiquitous mousetrap. He also experimented in powered flight, but his large aircraft designs were never successful. However, his "Captive Flying Machine" amusement ride became a staple of British fairgrounds.
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Maxim was born in Sangerville, Maine in the United States of America. He became an apprentice coachbuilder at the age of 14 and ten years later took up a job at the machine works of his uncle, Levi Stephens, at Fitchburg, Massachusetts. He subsequently worked as an instrument maker and as a draughtsman.
His children include: Hiram Percy Maxim; Florence Maxim, who married George Albert Cutter, and Adelaide Maxim, who married Eldon Joubert. [1]
Maxim is also credited with inventing the common mousetrap and, as a long-time sufferer from bronchitis, he also patented and manufactured the "Pipe of Peace", a menthol inhaler. Over the years he was involved in several patent disputes with Thomas Edison. One of these included the incandescent lightbulb.
Maxim emigrated to England in 1881 (by which time he'd given up trying to sell his bulb when it became clear Edison had won) and became a naturalized Briton in 1899. Queen Victoria knighted Maxim in 1901 for his inventions, many of which had military applications. Maxim founded an armaments company to produce his machine gun in Crayford, Kent, which was later bought out by the Vickers corporation in 1896, becoming 'Vickers, Son & Maxim'. Their updated version of the design, referred to as the Vickers gun, was the standard British machine gun for many years. Variants of the Maxim gun were used extensively by both sides during World War I. His brother Hudson Maxim was also a military inventor, specializing in explosives.
In 1911 he headed the newly formed Grahame-White, Bleriot, and Maxim Company, founded with the two aviators and two hundred thousand pounds of capital. [2]
Maxim died in London and is buried in West Norwood Cemetery. His son Hiram Percy Maxim followed in his father and uncle's footsteps and became a mechanical engineer and weapons designer as well, but he is perhaps best known for his early amateur radio experiments and for founding the American Radio Relay League. [3] Hiram was a mechanical engineering graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
- U.S. Patent 208,252 - Electric lamp
- U.S. Patent 230,310 - Electric lamp
- U.S. Patent 230,953 - Electric lamps
- U.S. Patent 230,954 - Process for removing air from globes of electric lamps
- U.S. Patent 230,309 - Electric lamp
- U.S. Patent 234,835 - Electrical lamp
- U.S. Patent 237,198 - Process of manufacturing carbon conductors
- U.S. Patent 244,277 - Electric Lamp
- U.S. Patent 247,083 - Process of Manufacturing Carbons
- U.S. Patent 247,084 - Incandescent Electric Lamp
- U.S. Patent 247,085 - Process of Manufacturing Carbon Conductors
- U.S. Patent 247,380 - Electric Lamp
- U.S. Patent 255,308 - Electrical meter
- U.S. Patent 277,846 - Process of Manufacturing Carbons for Incandescent Lamps
- U.S. Patent 283,629 - Electric Lamp
- U.S. Patent 405,239 - Apparatus for the Manufacture of Filaments for Incandescent Lamps
- U.S. Patent 405,170 - Manufacture of Filaments for Electric Lamps
- U.S. Patent 430,212 - Manufacture of explosive
- U.S. Patent 618,703 - Apparatus for Manufacturing Filaments for Electric Lamps
- U.S. Patent 618,704 - Method of Manufacturing Filaments for Electric Lamps
- GB189700207 (1897 with Louis Silverman) - automatic fire mechanism
- GB189607468 (1897) - gas action for machine guns
- GB189607045 (1897) - breech mechanism of machine gun
Hiram Percy Maxim (son):
- U.S. Patent 594,805 - Motor vehicle
- U.S. Patent 757,941 - Motor vehicle running gear
- U.S. Patent 772,571 - Electric motor vehicle
- U.S. Patent 845,106 - Motor road vehicle
- ^ "Hiram Percy Maxim, Wireless Amateur No. 1, Defended Rights of Youth", New York Times, February 23, 1936, Sunday. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. "Radio amateurs, numbering more than 45,000 in the United States, are mourning the loss of a friend and faithful ally in the passing of Hiram Percy Maxim of Hartford, Connecticut. As an ardent wireless amateur Mr. Maxim is remembered by veteran experimenters of pre-war days by the musical tone of his quench spark gap which spelled out the call letters of his pioneer station."
- ^ "Maxim Leads Air Company. Grahame-White, Bleriot and Maxim Company with $1,000,000 Capital.", New York Times. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. "Sir Hiram Maxim, who has just resigned from the ordnance firm with which his name has been for so long connected, will be the Chairman of a new company to be known as the Grahame-White, Bleriot, and Maxim Company, limited, with a total authorized capital of 200,000 ($1,000,000.)"
- ^ "Noise's Bogeyman", Time (magazine), Monday, January 4, 1932. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. "While mental hygienists, efficiency experts and city officials have been bewailing the maddening effects of city noise, Hiram Percy Maxim has been manufacturing noise mufflers at Hartford, Conn. Last week he announced that his Maxim Silencer Co., of which he is president and his only son Hiram Hamilton is chief engineer and whose factory is in Asylum Street, Hartford, will—besides continuing to make silencers for guns, motor exhausts, safety valves, air releases, in fact every kind of pipe which emits a gas—offer a consulting service in noise abatement."