biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1789–1864)
|
| biography:
| Inventor, born in Carreghova, Mid Glamorgan. An uneducated quarry worker, he had extraordinary mechanical skills, and went on to work for John Wilkinson and Henry Maudslay. In 1816 he established his own machine-tool business in Manchester, where he built one of the first metal-planing machines. His firm of Sharp, Roberts and Company manufactured a spinning mule as well as railway locomotives, beginning with the Experiment for the Liverpool & Manchester Railway in 1833. Although he continued to be a versatile inventor, he had little business acumen, and died impoverished. |
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