biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1716–72)
|
| biography:
| Engineer and canal builder, born in Thornsett, Derbyshire, C England, UK. Apprenticed to a millwright, he became an engineer, and contrived a water engine for draining a coalmine (1752). Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater, employed him to build the canal between Worsley and Manchester (1759), a difficult enterprise completed in 1772. He also commenced the Grand Trunk Canal, and completed the Birmingham, Chesterfield, and other canals. He was illiterate, solving most of his problems without writings or drawings. |
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