Frederick Arrowsmith Beswick
Frederick Arrowsmith Beswick (1861-1924) of the Manchester Steam Users Association
1924 Obituary [1]
FREDERICK ARROWSMITH BESWICK was born in 1861 in Manchester.
He received his early education at a private school and the Mechanics' Institute.
At the age of seventeen he entered the services of the Manchester Steam Users' Association for the Prevention of Steam-Boiler Explosions.
Realizing the need of a technical training he was apprenticed to Messrs. Woodhouse and Mitchell, general engineers and millwrights, Brighouse, and then attended a course of technical studies at Owens College (now the Victoria University, Manchester).
He then returned to the Manchester Steam Users' Association, in whose service he remained to the day of his death. His early duties were manifold. Besides his duties as a boiler inspector he had to collect information for the monthly reports of the Association as to the causes of boiler explosions, and when these publications were superseded by the Board of Trade Reports he attended most of the important explosion inquiries.
On the death of Mr. Lavington E. Fletcher in 1897, he was appointed assistant to the new Chief Engineer, taking charge of the department dealing with new boiler construction. This brought him into touch with all the leading boiler makers of the country. That period was a critical one f or the Lancashire boiler trade, for, due to very inelastic rules, based on marine practice, Lancashire boilers were becoming too rigid when used for high pressures. This difficulty was met by using corrugated furnaces and by reducing the thicknesses of flat plates. Since then Lancashire boilers of large dimensions have been worked without trouble at 200 lb. pressure and more.
His experience with exploded boilers and amongst new and old boilers, led to his appointment by the City and Guilds of London Institute as examiner in boilermakers' work, for which Corporation he had just completed his last examination paper.
His death took place at Broadbottom, near Manchester, on 13th March 1924, at the age of sixty-two.
He became a Member of this Institution in 1899; he was also a Member of the University of Manchester.