William Archer Porter Tait
William Archer Porter Tait (1866-1929)
1930 Obituary [1]
William Archer Porter Tait, second son of Professor Peter Guthrie Tait, was born at Edinburgh on the 25th March, 1866.
He was educated at Edinburgh Academy, and from 1881 to 1884 studied at the University of Edinburgh under Professor Fleeming Jenkin, M. Inst. C.E., obtaining the degree of B.Sc. in Engineering.
On leaving the University, he entered the shops of Messrs. Brown Brothers, hydraulic engineers, Edinburgh, and worked there as an apprentice fitter until November, 1885.
During the following 2 years he was a pupil of Mr. A. N. Anderson, M. Inst. C.E., and his successor, Mr. D. A. Matheson, M.Inst.C.E., contractor's engineer on the Lanarkshire and Ayrshire Railways then under construction. He described these works in a Students Paper, for which he was awarded a Miller prize.
In 1887 he was articled to Sir John Wolfe Barry, Past-President Inst. C.E., and Mr. H. M. Brunel, M. Inst. C.E., for a period of 3 years. The chief works upon which he was engaged were the Tower Bridge and the Barry docks and railways.
Having completed his apprenticeship, he remained with Sir John and Mr. Brunel as an assistant until January, 1891, when he joined the resident staff of Mr. G. M. Cunningham and Mr. Charles Forman, M. Inst. C.E., then Engineering-Chief of the Glasgow Central (Underground) Railway.
In 1894 he entered into partnership with Mr. James Wilson, M.Inst. C.E., Engineer to the Edinburgh and District Water Trust (now the Edinburgh Corporation Water Department), and senior member of the firm of Messrs. J. and A. Leslie and Reid. He was engaged in the preparation of Parliamentary plans and working drawings for the Talla scheme for the water-supply of Edinburgh, which he described in a Paper read before The Institution, for which he was awarded a Telford Premium.
He was concerned in the completion of the Water of Leith purification and sewerage, as well as the Lanarkshire Middle-Ward District Waterworks, which were carried out by the firm. The latter of these works he described in a Paper published by The Institution.
He was also engaged in the design and construction of numerous smaller water-supply works in Scotland, and was consulted in connection with schemes in all parts of the British Isles.
The death of Mr. Wilson in 1900 left Mr. Tait as the only surviving partner of the firm, and he carried on the practice alone until 1905, when Mr. W. Carstairs Reid, M. Inst. C.E., became a partner in the firm.
Mr. P. B. Glendinning, M. Inst. C.E., joined the firm in 1910.
The nature of Dr. Tait’s work required his frequent attendance before Parliamentary Committees, and from 1908 he had an office also in London. He was Chairman of a board of engineers who investigated the subject of water-supply to the City of Capetown in 1915; a member of the Commission appointed in 1917 by the Corporation of Manchester to inquire into the Hawes Water scheme; and a member of the Water Power Resources Committee set up by the Board of Trade in 1918.
He was a Vice-President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society.
Dr. Tait was admitted as a Student of The Institution in 1888, elected an Associate Member in 1891, and transferred to the class of Members in 1897. He became a Member of the Council in 1919, and was elected a Vice-President 10 years later, but did not live to take office.
He died at Edinburgh on the 23rd June, 1929.
In 1910 the degree of D.Sc. was conferred upon him by the University of Edinburgh.
He took a great interest in the Institution library and was particularly desirous that it should contain an adequate collection of books on legal matters affecting engineers. Shortly before his death he made a special donation to it, which with his approval was expended on the volumes of Lord Halsbury’s “Laws of England” ; and he bequeathed S500 to The Institution, which the Council have set aside in the hope that when the building is eventually completed it may be feasible to embody in the library some item of equipment which may form a permanent record of his interest in it.