James Bogardus

James Bogardus ( born March 14, 1800 Catskill, New York, † April 13, 1874 in New York City ) was an American inventor, architect and an important representative of American cast iron architecture.

Career

Bogardus parents owned a farm near Catskill, where he went to school until he began an apprenticeship with a watchmaker at the age of 14 years. In 1820 he went for three years to Savannah (Georgia ), there to learn the Graveurhandwerk. When he returned in 1823 after Catskill, where he opened his own watchmaking and engraving shop.

Inventions

Before James Bogardus be stronger turning of Architecture, he made himself as the inventor a name. First, with an eight-day, three-wheeled chronometer with which he attained the highest award at the First Fair of the American Institute of the City of New York. He then moved to New York City, where he lived until his death and was able to live well from his inventions.

In 1828 he invented the "ring - flyers " or "ring -spinner ", a cotton spinning machine, which was in general use later. A little later he developed a Random Orbital Sander, in which the grinding stones and sanding pads for the first time rotated in the same direction in nearly the same speed. This principle is still used today for fine grinding of lenses or ball bearings.

In 1831 he married Margaret McClay. The marriage remained childless. In the same year he built an engraving machine that could create dials of gold watches within a work cycle - including filigree work, rays from the center of the dial and the numerals. This machine also created stamping dies, such as the lower punch, with the Gold Medal of the American Institute of the City of New York was coined. He also invented a machine capable of printing block could be created for the printing of banknotes from different printing plates.

1832 had he patented the first dry gas meter, for which he received the Gold Medal of the American Institute of the City of New York.

1836 Bogardus went to England to register a patent while getting to know cast iron as a building material. During this stay in England he built in 1836 a metal engraving machine, created with the portraits of Queen Victoria, Sir Robert Peel and other personalities. He also constructed in London a machine with which all machine-produced engravings could be copied, but it was the machine is not possible to copy works that were created with this machine.

1838 wrote the British government for a price from the best plan for the production of stamps. The proposal of James Bogardus beat out 2600 competitors. The proposed principle is to use today.

In addition to various other inventions he patented a machine bathymetry, a dynamometer for measuring the speed and strength of machines ( 1848), as well as a precise pyrometer.

Buildings and Architecture

On a trip to Italy in 1840 to Bogardus was aware that cast iron would be an ideal material to make ornaments for building facades. When he returned to New York City, he had made ​​up his mind, entire buildings to build in cast iron - including walls, roofs, floors, etc. Although there were in New York City since the 1820s facades made ​​of cast iron, but Bogardus was the first to recognize, the cast iron is stable, durable, lightweight and fireproof, it is a suitable material for all elements of a building in cities. A special advantage he saw that virtually any shape and size can be made ​​of cast iron. This opened up new possibilities in terms of the mass production of prefabricated components that could be quickly assembled at the building site. This made it possible to produce structures with ornamentation at a lower cost.

When James Bogardus 1848 built his five-storey factory in New York City, he used exclusively components from cast iron. It was the first building in the United States, which was built this way. This was the beginning of the skeletal structure made of cast iron. Here, the previously brick exterior walls were replaced by iron columns that served as supports of the upper floors of a building. Even during the construction of the building project was a mockery, as contemporaries were of the opinion that the building would either collapse under its own weight or would be destroyed by lightning. Since the finished building but then became an eye-catching, the scorn smote finally into consideration and orders for building of cast iron construction began at Bogardus respond - before all of New York City, but also from Philadelphia, Boston, Washington DC, Baltimore and Chicago. Now James Bogardus was particular focus on the building of buildings with cast iron frame construction. According to the New York Herald, April 14, 1874 Bogardus transported the finished components for a huge building to Cuba.

In 1850 he filed a patent for its advanced use of cast iron as a building material. In the two decades that followed, he showed as cast iron can be used in the construction of building facades. The success of the cast-iron façade 1850-1880 led to the use of steel frame construction with all buildings, including offices, goods and warehouses.

Bogardus brought to the signs on buildings built by him that read: " James Bogardus Originator & Patentee of Iron Buildings Pat ' May 7, 1850 " (translated: " James Bogardus inventor and holder of the patent for iron building from May 7, 1850 " )

Bogardus built in New York City also some fire - watch towers made ​​of cast iron and so-called " shot towers" ( shot tower ), in which balls or shot were made for firearms by molten lead of about 30 meters into a basin with cold water let drip. As the tallest of these buildings was more than 60 meters high, these buildings are seen by architectural historians as a forerunner of modern skyscrapers.

The following buildings by James Bogardus have remained in New York City today: 63 Nassau Street, 254 Canal Street, 75 Murray Street, 85 Leonard Street, Iron Clad Building, Cooperstown, New York (92 Main St, Cooperstown, NY).

Although Bogardus was at that time an important personality who drew attention to himself by many innovations and inventions, it is now advised especially in Europe into oblivion. In New York City a small park in TriBeCa remembered him: James Bogardus Triangle. It is located at the point where Chambers Street, Hudson Street and West Broadway meet.