Charles Mattathias Jacobs
Charles Mattathias Jacobs (1850-1919)
of 126 Bute Docks, Cardiff.
1895 'NEWPORT MAN IN AMERICA. AN EMINENT ENGINEER'S ACHIEVEMENTS. A BRIDGE TO RIVAL TUE FORTH BRIDGE.
Newport has been visited during the past week by a gentleman who has had and still has intimate connection with its commercial life, but who for past few years has been better known by his achievements as a civil engineer in the United States than in his native country. That is Mr Charles M. Jacobs, one of the directors of the Uskside Engineering Co., Newport, who has now in hand in New York one of the greatest engineering works of the age — a huge bridge connecting Brooklyn and Long Island with New York. Upon hearing that this gentleman was in Newport, a representative of the Argus sought him out, and in the course of the interview to which Mr Jacobs submitted, gained some interesting information as to his work in America. Mr Jacobs has offices in New York and London, but during the past six years he has been engaged almost entirely in America, leaving the English practice to his partner. He is a frequent visitor to England, but his work is practically all in America. In answer to a question as to his connection with Newport, Mr Jacobs said, "I am a director of the Uskside; I was as one of the original men in Mordey and Carneys; I was one of the original holders in the Patent Fuel Company in Newport; I have been connected with other Newport works. I still have a financial stake in the town.
"What led you to go to America"? — "I went out to study the question of utilising the waste steam coal in Pennsylvania for the Philadelphia and Reading Railway Company, and by my advice and under my direction large patent fuel works were erected. The orders for the plant were sent to the Uskside Works, and it has never given us a day's trouble. It has given the greatest satisfaction in the States. Patent fuel plant is a speciality with the Uskside, and theirs stands higher than other firms in the country."
"That led to other work in America?" — "Owing to that connection I was requested to take charge of works of a more serious character. At the present time I am consulting engineer to two railways in New York State. There has been great discussion in New York on the rapid transit question, and on behalf of the President of the Philadelphia and Reading Railway I have designed a complete system of tunnelling in New York for this purposes of an underground railway. I have also designed for the Pennsylvania and other interests a tunnel under the Hudson, under New York, under the East River, connecting the Pennsylvania Railway with the Long Island Railway in Brooklyn. ....
"And what of the great bridge which you have designed?" — "The work is commenced. The bridge is upon the cantilever principle, with a continuous girder across Blackwell's Island, which is an island in the centre of the East River......
"You return to America soon? — "In about a week. I do not work in England, though I am a member of the Institute of Civil Eagineers and of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers. What is of considerable interest to Newport is that Mr J. Vipond Davies, son of Dr. Andrew Davies, of Celf-parc, Maindee, is associated with me in this work. He has lately been made a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers."[1]
1920 Obituary [2]
CHARLES MATTATHIAS JACOBS was born at Hull on 8th June 1850.
Having been educated by private tuition, he was apprenticed in 1866 to Messrs. C. and W. Earle, marine engineers and shipbuilders, of Hull, and on the completion of his apprenticeship, five years later, he was sent by the firm to China to put up some bridges which they had contracted to build.
On his return to England he decided to follow the profession of a marine engineer, and accordingly went to sea for about three years, obtaining the First Class Certificate of the Board of Trade.
In 1876 he commenced to practise as a consulting engineer in Cardiff, specializing in marine engineering, and shortly afterwards he was appointed surveyor to Lloyd's Register at Cardiff, which office he held for a few years. During this period he became recognized as an expert on the question of the utilization of the slack coal-dust from the non-coking coals of South Wales and Monmouthshire.
In 1887 he removed to London, where he opened a consulting engineers' office in partnership with Mr. Herbert Barringer, Member, under the title of Jacobs and Barringer, and this partnership continued until his death.
Early in 1889 he visited the United States to advise the late Mr. Austin Corbin as to the possible utilization of the culm or waste produced in the digging of anthracite coal in the fields of the Philadelphia and Reading Coal and Iron Co., and he thus became identified as a consulting engineer, with all the engineering problems, of the various interests controlled by Mr. Corbin.
In 1891 Mr. Jacobs opened a consulting engineer's office in New York, his chief assistant being Mr. J. V. Davies, with whom he entered into partnership later. This continued until 1916, when he retired from practice in the United States.
During this period he was engaged upon many important works; in 1892 be undertook for the East River Gas Co., the supervision, as chief engineer, of the construction of a tunnel, 10 feet 2 inches internal diameter, to connect the Company's plant at Ravenswood, Long Island, with the Borough of Manhattan.
In 1895 he was appointed by the bondholders of the Company owning the unfinished and abandoned Hudson River tunnel at New York, as one of a committee of three to examine and report upon the possibility of finishing the work. This was successfully done by Mr. Jacobs as chief engineer. The work was described by him in a Paper read before the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1910, for which he was awarded the Telford Gold Medal.
In 1898 Mr. Jacobs, with his London partner, Mr. Barringer, prepared the plans and specifications and was awarded the contract for the Tredegar Dry Dock at Newport, Mon.
The other great New York project with which the name of Mr. Jacobs will always be linked is that which brings into New York the terminal of the Pennsylvania Railroad; this is fully described in Papers by himself and his coadjutors in the Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vols. 68 and 69. Both these great undertakings referred to above, involving the crossing of the North River by six different tunnels, were carried out by Mr. Jacobs simultaneously between the years 1901 and 1910.
Many other works of large size and great difficulty have been carried out under his general direction, and some of these may be cited. A pipe-line 270 miles long of 10-inch pipe and 30 miles of 4-inch pipe for the Burmah Oil Co. from Rangoon to Yenangyat; tube tunnels under the River Seine in Paris; the Astoria tunnel below the East River, New York; Hales Bar lock and dam across the Tennessee River near Chattanooga; the Laxaxalpan aqueduct tunnels of the Mexican Light and Power Co.; and many various schemes in the United States, Canada, Russia, India, etc. Latterly he resided at Wimbledon, but his death took place at his country house at Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, on 7th September 1919, at the age of sixty-nine.
He became a Member of this Institution in 1876.
See Also
Sources of Information
- ↑ South Wales Weekly Argus and Monmouthshire Advertiser, 9 March 1895
- ↑ 1920 Institution of Mechanical Engineers: Obituaries