TREVITHICK, RICHARD (1771-1833), English engineer and inventor, was born on April 13 in the parish of Illogan, Corn wall, and was the only son of Richard Trevithick (1735-97), manager of the Dolcoath and other important Cornish mines. His earliest invention of importance was his improved plunger pole pump (1797) for deep mining, and in 1798 he applied the principle of the plunger pole pump to the construction of a water-pressure engine, which he subsequently improved in various ways. Two years later he built a high-pressure non-condensing steam-engine, which became a rival of the low-pressure steam-vacuum engine of Watt. He was a precursor of George Stephenson in the con struction of locomotive engines. On Christmas Eve 180i his com mon road locomotive carried the first load of passengers ever con veyed by steam, and on March 24, 1802 he and Andrew Vivian applied for a patent for steam-engines in propelling carriages. In 1803 another steam vehicle made by him was run in the streets of London, from Leather Lane along Oxford Street to Paddington, the return journey being made by Islington. He next built a steam locomotive for tramways, and in Feb. 1804 at Pen-y-darran in Wales he worked a tramroad locomotive which was able to haul 20 tons of iron ; a similar engine was supplied to the Wylam col liery (Newcastle) in the following year. In 1808 he constructed a circular railway in London near Euston Square, on which the public were carried at the rate of 12 or 15 miles an hour round curves of 5o or zoo ft. radius. Trevithick applied his high-pressure engine
with great success to rock boring and breaking, as well as to dredging. In 1806 he contracted with the board of Trinity House, London, to lift ballast from the bottom of the Thames, at the rate of 500,000 tons a year, for a payment of 6d. a ton. Trevithick was the first to recognize the importance of iron in the construc tion of large ships, and in various ways his ideas also influenced the construction of steamboats. He was a pioneer in the applica tion of steam to agriculture. A high-pressure steam threshing engine was erected by him in 1812 at Trewithen, while in the same year, in a letter to the Board of Agriculture, he stated his belief that every process in agriculture might be performed by steam, and that such a use of the steam-engine would "double the population of the kingdom and make our markets the cheapest in the world." In 1814 he entered on an agreement for the con struction of engines for mines in Peru, and to superintend their working removed to Peru in 1816. Thence he went in 1822 to Costa Rica. He returned to England in 1827, and in 1828 tioned parliament for a reward for his inventions, but without suc cess. He died, penniless, at Dartford on April 22, 1833.