Here are 100 books that Henry Maudslay and the Pioneers of the Machine Age fans have personally recommended if you like
Henry Maudslay and the Pioneers of the Machine Age.
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As a teacher and writer, I am a passionate believer in the ideals of the Enlightenment. In my understanding of these ideals, they include a belief in reason and honest inquiry in the service of humanity. More and more we need these ideals against bigotry, self-delusion, greed, and cruelty. The books recommended here are among those that helped to inspire me with continued faith in the progress of the human species and our responsibility to help each other and the world we live in.
What really attracted to me about this book was Jenny Uglow’s ability to bring the eighteenth century alive in her biographies of five men – Josiah Wedgwood, Mathew Boulton, James Watt, Eramus Darwin, and Joseph Priestley – who met every month near Birmingham when the moon was full (so that they could see their way home).
These men genuinely transformed the world with their discoveries that created and powered the first factories and revolutionized our understanding of the natural and chemical worlds. For some reason I always remember Uglow’s description of Wedgwood, who invented the process for mass producing china, being so scientifically curious that he insisted on sitting up to watch his own leg being amputated.
This book is a wonderful, personal introduction to the English Enlightenment.
In the 1760s a group of amateur experimenters met and made friends in the English Midlands. Most came from humble families, all lived far from the center of things, but they were young and their optimism was boundless: together they would change the world. Among them were the ambitious toymaker Matthew Boulton and his partner James Watt, of steam-engine fame; the potter Josiah Wedgwood; the larger-than-life Erasmus Darwin, physician, poet, inventor, and theorist of evolution (a forerunner of his grandson Charles). Later came Joseph Priestley, discoverer of oxygen and fighting radical.
In 1972, I enrolled in Professor Alfred D. Chandler's Business History course at Harvard Business School, exploring the business strategies and organization structures of U.S. businesses during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chandler impressed upon me the value of examining businesses' strategies and their outcomes. His lessons ignited my interest in the Industrial Revolution in Britain, the prequel to the American story. Combining a business background and proclivity for historical knowledge, I discovered that the period's successes depended on more than just production technology. Effective marketing, control systems, and logistics played key roles, while on a national scale, the scientific method and commercial competition were also crucial.
Men of Iron examines the Crowley Iron Works, one of the eighteenth century’s foremost industrial enterprises.
Sir Ambrose Crowley founded it and used his understanding of the period’s logistics to undercut competitors by setting up a nailery in Sunderland, moving to Winlaton in 1691. There he could import bar iron from Sweden and ship products by sea to a London warehouse complex, avoiding the era’s slow and muddy roads.
With the good fortune of two lengthy wars, he built a major military supply business, with 1,500 employees, becoming a City of London Alderman and a Tory MP. At Winlaton, he established the “Law Book of the Crowley Iron Works” which instituted enlightened personnel policies and an old-age pension scheme.
Crowley’s life shows that the Industrial Revolution, which included new techniques of HR and logistics management as much as steam engines, was already stirring before 1700.
Last published in 1962, this renowned work of industrial and social history is now made available to a new generation by the Land of Oak & Iron, thanks to the kind permission of the author's sons, Mark and Hugh Flinn.Until the Land of Oak & Iron Project brought the site to public attention, the fact that Winlaton, Winlaton Mill and Swalwell had been the site of the largest early ironworks in Europe was largely forgotten.We may never know why Sir Ambrose Crowley chose the Derwent Valley as the manufacturing and distribution centre for his London-based company, but what we do…
In 1972, I enrolled in Professor Alfred D. Chandler's Business History course at Harvard Business School, exploring the business strategies and organization structures of U.S. businesses during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chandler impressed upon me the value of examining businesses' strategies and their outcomes. His lessons ignited my interest in the Industrial Revolution in Britain, the prequel to the American story. Combining a business background and proclivity for historical knowledge, I discovered that the period's successes depended on more than just production technology. Effective marketing, control systems, and logistics played key roles, while on a national scale, the scientific method and commercial competition were also crucial.
James Brindley built the core elements of Britain’s canal system, which halved the coal price in several industrial cities.
He began as the son of an impoverished rural farmer, then apprenticed to a millwright, before setting up as a craftsman-engineer. Granville Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl Gower hired him to survey a potential Trent and Mersey Canal, before introducing him to his brother-in-law Samuel Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater who wanted to connect his Worsley coal mines to Manchester.
Corble’s book centres on the Bridgewater Canal, which Brindley surveyed, developing new “puddling” techniques to seal the bottom. Brindley then used the Bridgewater Canal as a demonstration project for his much larger “Grand Cross” canal system, connecting the Severn, Trent, Mersey, and Thames rivers.
With Gower’s help, Brindley got Parliamentary authorization, raising capital from local landowners and country banks. Brindley’s Grand Cross became a gigantic infrastructure leap forward, kick-starting the Industrial Revolution.
It can be said of few men that without them the course of their nation's history would have been very different, yet through the force of his ideas and sheer bloody-mindedness, James Brindley, the first great canal builder, provided the spark that ignited the Industrial Revolution, united the nation and set Britain on course to become the world's first superpower. Born into poverty and barely literate, Brindley had a vision for the country that defied both established society and the natural order, dividing mid-eighteenth-century scientific and political opinion. Crowds flocked to marvel at this new canals and the engineering feats…
In 1972, I enrolled in Professor Alfred D. Chandler's Business History course at Harvard Business School, exploring the business strategies and organization structures of U.S. businesses during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chandler impressed upon me the value of examining businesses' strategies and their outcomes. His lessons ignited my interest in the Industrial Revolution in Britain, the prequel to the American story. Combining a business background and proclivity for historical knowledge, I discovered that the period's successes depended on more than just production technology. Effective marketing, control systems, and logistics played key roles, while on a national scale, the scientific method and commercial competition were also crucial.
Josiah Wedgwood (1730-95) was a pioneer in the many non-steam-engine aspects of the Industrial Revolution.
Descended from a long line of low-end potters, Wedgwood specialized in design, then joined the high-quality pottery of Thomas Whieldon before in 1759 setting up his own business in pottery. Wedgwood was an excellent chemist, discovering several new glazes that revolutionized the pottery business.
He was also a superlative marketer, using a sale to Queen Charlotte to market “Queen’s Ware,” marketing “Etruscan” pottery with a specialized glaze to fulfil a mania for Etruscan art following new discoveries and opening a London showroom to attract wealthy patrons – he pioneered the production of chinaware for display as well as for use.
His “Etruria” works opened in 1771 beside the new Trent and Mersey Canal, which revolutionized pottery transportation, reducing breakages. Dolan gives a lively account of this multiple innovator, whose business survives today.
A definitive portrait of the pioneering entrepreneur describes how Josiah Wedgwood rose from the scion of a family of struggling potters to become one of the world's wealthiest and most powerful men during the eighteenth century and explains how he revolutionized the business model of his time with innovations that have continued into the present. 25,000 first printing.
I read a lot of literary fiction. At the moment, I’m finishing To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara, which I’ve enjoyed and whose novel, A Little Life,was brilliant. My interest in thriller fiction is sparked by writers who bring their considerable literary talents to their trade. John LeCarré comes to mind. Writers who sacrifice depth of character or concern for place quickly lose my interest. Thankfully, there are many thriller writers who do a superb job of keeping my wandering nature in check. (A quick note: I also write dystopian fiction under my pen name James Jaros.)
The Rape of the Rose is an unforgettable novel that details the horrors of the Industrial Revolution in nineteenth-century Britain. Hughes, also a poet of note, portrays the enslavement of children in those “dark Satanic mills” with disturbing precision, offering his youngest characters shreds of dignity, which life has deprived them of so roundly. He also shows men and women maimed and worked to death by owners intent on extracting every last ounce of their labor. A major figure in the novel is a father who flees a mill and joins the Luddite Revolution. I read this book thirty-five years ago and remember it vividly. It presents the underbelly of the Industrial Revolution—and the ample reasons for the rebellions it triggered.
Set in 1812, this novel concerns Mor Greave, a self-educated man, who is caught up in an English revolution in the North. He is hunted by the authorities and becomes drawn into a underworld of duplicity, passion and sexual licence he never imagined.
I am not a naturalist but consider myself a practitioner of ”lyrical naturalism.” My interest is in the descriptions of nature by poets and artists in previous centuries. The dream is to inspire people to look at the natural environment through the lens of art and poetry rather than the somewhat dry frameworks of botany. My great hero is John Ruskin, a British writer whose lyrical prose has never stopped enchanting its readers. I was very happy to publish a book of essays titled Woodland Imagery in Northern Art, c. 1500-1800: Poetry and Ecology. I hope that its richly illustrated essays will inspire readers to look at the environment with renewed wonder.
This book has given me more delight than just about any other book dealing with the woodlands. It is not a herbarium or any other dry enumeration of plants. The Oxford Don takes us by the hand and shows us enchanted spinneys, lovely copses, ancient savannas, woodland pastures, and so much more that were once enchanting. In the everyday environment, the inspiration of poets, the meeting place of lovers, and the haunt of human beings seeking solitude.
"A state-of-the-art survey of Britain’s woods by the acknowledged expert in the field… He seems to know woods like old friends, each with its unique past, its cranky or capricious personality, and its hoard of secrets. And he writes like an angel.” - The Times
'Trees are wildlife just as deer or primroses are wildlife. Each species has its own agenda and its own interactions with human activities ..., Written by one of Britain,s best-known naturalists, Woodlands offers a fascinating new insight into the trees of the British landscape that have filled us with awe and inspiration throughout the centuries. Looking at such diverse evidence as the woods used in buildings and ships, and how woodland has been portrayed in pictures and photographs, Rackham traces British woodland through the ages, from the evolution of wildwood, through man,s effect on the landscape, modern forestry and its…
During my career as an author, I have written on everything from U.S. Presidents to natural disasters. My true passion, however, is military history, a subject I have followed closely since childhood. Why? I have no idea. Nevertheless, I have read widely on the subject and, with the publication of Outnumbered, fulfilled a longstanding dream. The early modern period of European history, during which the continent’s culture left behind the Middle Ages and laid the foundations of the world we live in today, was an era rife with military change and innovation, as well as endemic conflict and the emergence of powerful, centralized nation-states, all of which I find enthralling. These books bring this time and place to life.
In the year 1500 European civilization was fractured, deficient in natural resources, and unremarkable in its military technology. By 1800 it had gained control over one-third of the globe. How? This seminal work by Geoffrey Parker tackles that question with a sweeping assessment of global developments during the period, revealing the suite of innovations that allowed the West to expand so dramatically. Sparking a debate that continues to this day, it is a must-read on the subject of early modern technology, imperialism, and warfare.
This is a new edition of Geoffrey Parker's much-admired illustrated account of how the West, so small and so deficient in natural resources in 1500, had by 1800 come to control over one-third of the world. Parker argues that the rapid development of military practice in the West constituted a 'military revolution' which gave Westerners an insurmountable advantage over the peoples of other continents. This edition incorporates new material, including a substantial 'Afterword' which summarises the debate which developed after the book's first publication.
In spite of many setbacks, living standards have trended upwards over the last 10,000 years. One of my main interests as an economist has been to understand the sources of this trend and its broad effects. The key driving force is new technologies. We are better off than our Victorian ancestors, not because we have more of what they had but because we have new things, such as airplanes and indoor plumbing. However, these new technologies have also brought some unfortunate side effects. We need to understand that dealing with these successfully depends, not on returning to the use of previous technologies, but on developing newer technologies such as wind and solar power.
Using the modern view of science, many economic historians have sought to diminish the effects of science on the technologies in the 18th and 19th centuries. This wonderful book by a sociologist documents how science, as it was then practiced, pervaded the whole structure of British society, from preachers teaching that Newton had revealed the architecture that God had imposed during creation, to a journal teaching Newtonian science to women. As Jacob puts it: “The role of science…was not that of general laws leading to the development of specific applications. Instead it…[provided] the theoretical mechanics and the practical mathematics that facilitated technological change. Brought together by a shared technical vocabulary of Newtonian origin, engineers and entrepreneurs…negotiated…the mechanization of workshops or the improvement of canals, mines, and harbours.
This book seeks to explain the historical process by which in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries scientific knowledge became an integral part of the culture of Europe and how this in turn led to the Industrial Revolution. Comparative in structure, Jacob explains why England was so much more successful at this transition than its continental counterparts.
I’m an award-winning biographer and critic. My essays and reviews appear regularly in the London Review of Books and the Times Literary Supplement, and I teach literature and creative writing at King’s College London. I’ve always loved stories about the lives of great writers – stories that seek to illuminate genius, without ever explaining it away.
This is one of the great literary biographies: impeccably researched, stylishly narrated, refreshingly indifferent to academic convention, and authentically Dickensian in its pungency of atmosphere and solidity of characterisation.
Dickens was a landmark biography when first published in 1990. This specially edited shorter edition takes the reader into the life of one of the world's greatest writers.
Here, Ackroyd attempts to peel away the mask of a man whose life was outwardly a picture of Victorian rectitude, but whose love life was as complicated (and unconventional) as any modern writer's. Dickens had everything - fame, success and riches - but he died harbouring a deep sadness he had experienced all his life. He was a man of mercurial character, had enormous vitality and humour, but he also had a…
Maybe it's because I'm an Aquarius, or maybe it's because I ate crayons as a kid. But people who know me well can confirm that I'm an oddball who has never fit neatly into boxes or been easy to categorize. Perhaps that’s why I've always enjoyed reading books that defy rules, break barriers, and cross genres. As an author, while I love grounding my books in reality for maximum authenticity, my stories definitely color outside the lines (see earlier crayon reference). I love reading and writing about the unconventional and the unexpected. If you're looking for romances that will take you off the beaten path, this list is for you.
Nowhere have I seen Cold Magic categorized as a romance, but as a reader, my experience of the book (and the rest of the trilogy) was definitely centered around the epic love story. But that's what places this book in the "off the beaten path" category for me – it could sit on several different sections in a bookstore or library: science fiction, fantasy, Steampunk, mystery, action/adventure, romance, or all of the above! Books like this are a gourmet feast for the imagination, particularly when they're handled by a masterful writer and builder of worlds like Kate Elliott. If you love discovering new series that will delight and surprise you while entertaining all the different parts of your brain, you will love The Spiritwalker Trilogy.
From one of the genre's finest writers comes a bold new epic fantasy in which science and magic are locked in a deadly struggle.
It is the dawn of a new age. . . The Industrial Revolution has begun, factories are springing up across the country, and new technologies are transforming in the cities. But the old ways do not die easy.
Cat and Bee are part of this revolution. Young women at college, learning of the science that will shape their future and ignorant of the magics that rule their families. But all of that will change when the…
