The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-11-03
.AUTAHBOY'S HONORS
The Success Achieved by John
Patten in New York.
NUMEROUS USEFUL INVENTIONS.
An Uphill Struggle Against Adversely, but
the Top is Being Very
Rapidly Reached.

4AoPluiJ hCdCuCu.
Nav YORK, Oct. %, 1889 Especial cor
respondence of The HERALD. Did any
one else ever have the sensations expert
enceo by plain, homespun, Utah boy for
the first time out of sight of the mountains
and wales Of the Queen of the Westl"
troW not. He never before saw the sun
rise out of a corn patch; he probably
never saw the horizon on the level before
He has heard OF the prairies. but he does
not know what it is 30 see the country
stretching out as far as the eye can reach
without any backing, so to say. His
teachers have told him of the forests where
nuts lay scattered over the ground, but he
never imagines such prodigality of lux
uries as the reality presents to his aston
ished gaze. School compositions he has
heard by the score, wherein it was set
down that New York is big city," but
the hustle and hurry and jam, the lodging
on the street crossings to keep from being
run over, the sight of ships and the sea, are
experiences he is little prepared for.
But his surprises are not all of the most
pleasant order. The prevalence of drunk
enness and of saloons, the lack Of sociabil-
ity among the people, and the too apparent
CLASS DISTINCTIONS
are in painful contrast to anything he has
ever before witnessed. He finds that in
deed and in truth he was right when he
wrote that sage effusion, New York is
big city" Here are the thronging thou
sands Of poor, the well-to-do, and the
wealthy; the lower ten thousand and the
upper ten; the Bowery, Wall street and
Fifth avenue; the pigmies intellectually,
and the intellectual giants of the nation,
all within the range of an hours observa-
ton. And just here it is satisfaction to
note that among the latter class, Utah is
not without honor. Whether in the lecture
rooms of the Academy of Science, or in the
principal machine shops, or in the large
chemical works of the city, one hears the
name of John Patten, a Utah boy, born and
bred, respectfully mentioned as an author
lty. In short interview with Mr.. Patten,
your correspondent learned the cause of
such favorable mention. Some time ago.
THE HERALD noticed an invention of this
gentlenan's while his efforts were confined
to San Francisco, and short sketch of
his progress will not be uninteresting now
Leaving
HIS FATHERS HOME At MANTI,
where he was born, at the age of fourteen,
uneducated and alone, Mr.. Patten, now
only thirty-three years old, has attained
prominent position among the foremost in
tellectual lights of the age. The first four
or five years of his pilgrimage were spent
in the mines of Nevada, where he COM
menced with the pick and shovel Here he
worked up through the various occupations,
in the course of which he obtained an Gle
mentary knowledge of chemistry, through
learning assaying, and while familiarizing
himself with mining machinery made some
hydraulic inventions for draining mines,
after which he quit mining and went to
San Francisco to introduce them. He
spent i've or six years in California with
varying success, his principal accomplish
ment being the introduction of a system of
draining deep mines through a single pipe
without the use of pump rods, having the
power located at the surface, thereby pro-
ducing what is equivalent to an unlimited
suction pipe. Its practicability was demon
stated. but was not extensively used on
account of the lack of capital to introduce
it. OF this invention mention was made
in TEE HERALD at the time
THESE FIRST FEW YEARS
of experience resulted more in educating
Mr.. Patten than in anything else. He
came east some six or seven years ago,
without friends or capital. Though his
time has been chiefly devoted to inventions
he has made remarkable intellectual re
searches, devoting the principal part of his
leisure time to the study of physical astron-
Omy, and has discovered several very i'm
portant astronomical laws now being made
public. Among these is the refutation of
the old theory that tides are caused by the
attraction of the moon: instead of which
he advances a new theory which seem to be
accepted by those who understand it, and
has not been refuted MIR. Patten first
made complete set of calculations, show
ing the exact influence Of the attraction of
the moon on the ocean around the entile
circumference of the earth, demons trating
that the tides could not be produced by the
moons attraction. These calculations and
diagrams have been presented to the New
York Academy of Science, of which Mr..
Patten is member, together with the new
theory, and has SO far elected only favor
able comment. He attributes the tides to
slight variations in the velocity of the
earth's surface, due to the combination of
motions the earth has by simultaneously
revolving about the centre of gravity be-
tween it and the moon, its revolution about
the sun, and it's rotation upon its axis He
demonstrated that
THE TIDE-PRoDUCING FORCES
are several thousand times greater than
the disturbing influences of the moon, and
that the tides appear to be in harmony with
his new theory. A complete exposition of
the matter will soon be published in book
form. Now, what can ever be found to
take the place of that charming poetic
fancy Of the courtship going on between
the tides and the moon.
Mr.. Patten has also demonstrated the
cause of the discrepancies of Keppler's
laws, and has prOpounded a new set of
formulas directly from the laws of motion
and universal grsvitation for calculating
the various elements of the solar system,
which moves in exact harmony with them.
the discrepancies being within the range of
errors of observation. In his leisure time
he is now preparing work on the
mechanics of astronomy, having already
completed most of the mathematical work
for it. But the most of Mr.. Patterns time
has been
DEVOTED TO USEFUL INVENTIONS,
among which is machine for distributing
type One of these has been completed,
and works successfully, distributing about
FIVE hundred letters per minute. placing
with absolute accuracy each letter in IT'S
proper box.
Another of his inventions is machine
for lasting shoes, by which the uppers are
stretched, fitted over the last and fastened
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