BEACH, Alfred Ely: b. Springfield, Mass., 1 Sept. 1826; d. 1 Jan. 1896. He was a son of Moses Yale Beach, and after receiving an edu cation in the Monson Academy at Monson, Mass. he was associated with his father in the publishing business of the New York Sun. In 1846 he formed a partnership with his life-long friend and schoolmate, Mr. Orson D. Munn, of Monson, Mass., and purchased the Scientific American from Rufus Porter, combining with the business of publishing that of soliciting pat ents. In 1847 he invented a typewriter which printed raised letters on a strip of paper, In tended for the blind, and was awarded a gold medal at the Crystal Palace Exposition. This machine is noteworthy as the first to cover a principle developed into the modern typewriter, viz, a basket of levers arranged in a circle, and delivering their impiession on a common centre. In 1867 he constructed a suspended tube eight feet in diameter by 100 feet long, through which passengers were carried back and forth in a tightly fitting car, as the air was exhausted from or forced into the tube by a rotating fan. He also devised means for trans porting letters through a tube under the street, by which they could be conveyed directly to the post-office when dropped into a street letter box.
His most important invention,—a shield for tunneling under streets or rivers without dis turbing the surface,— was made in 1868, and became known as the Beach shield. It resem
bled a gigantic hogshead with the heads re moved, the front circular edge being sharp, and the rear end having a thin iron hood. This cylinder is propelled slowly forward through the earth by several hydraulic rams forced out from the rear of the shield, by the operation of a single hydraulic pump, against the completed tunnel in the rear. By this method only the amount of earth to be occupied by the tunnel is excavated. After the shield is forced for ward the hydraulic rams are pushed back, and in the thin hood at the rear a new section of the tunnel is constructed. In 1869, by means of such a shield, Mr. Beach constructed a tun nel nine feet in diameter under Broadway, New York, from the corner of Warren street south to a point opposite the lower side of Murray street, and in 1870 a car was sent to' and fro on tracks through this tunnel by pneumatic power — the first underground transit in New York. From 1872 to 1876 Mr. Beach edited an annual publication entitled Science Record, published by the Scientific American. In 1876 he originated the Scientific American Supple ment, devoted to the publication of scientific matters in extenso, taken largely from ex changes and foreign publications. He was also instrumental in beginning the publication of the Scientific American Builders' Monthly.