The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-07-30
CENTENARY OF THOMAS
 RODMAN, INVENTOR
 OF FIRST BIG GUNS

< Today is the centenary of the birth
 of Thomas Jefferson Rodman, the
 American inventor and ordnance e2- pert who initiated the movement for
 big guns which has eliminated in the giant siege guns now in use in Europe. Rodman was a, Hoosier by bipth, Salem, Ind, having been his
 native town. He entered West Point, from which institution he graduated in 1S41, and entered the ordnance | department of the United States
 army. He early devoted himself to experiments with guns and gunpoW- der. &
 Rodman's greatest triumph was the invention of a method of casting guns hollow and cooling them from the in
 side, which worked a revolution in the making of artillery. The long and earnest study devoted to the proper ties and manipulation of cast iron, then regarded as best for the large castings required for heavy ordnance, by Rodman and other. ordnance off, l cers, enabled the United States to ere ate a system of heavy guns then ad- raittedly the best in the world The Rodman process of hollow casting
 and interior cooling marked great advance in artillery. In 1860 a can l5non. weighing tl1irty-five tons, the
 largest in the world. was cast, but | the exigencies of the civil war requ1r- ed larger and Better cannon. In 1868 the masterpiece of the system was cast-a 20-inch smooth-bore weigh ing 115-9O0 pounds, or nearly hfty- eight tons, and throwing a solid shot of 1,0SO pounds. This great gun at ttracted international attention, and
 many years passed before it was sur
 passed in size and effectiveness.
 Rodpnat1 also introduced the use of | e.. 4I.0 ,fa10 and 2O-inch smooth-bore guns of his invention. During the civil war Rod-
 mans guns were used in the navy as well as in the army, and they were of
 gerat assistance in deciding the strug-
 gle between the states in favor of the north. During the war period Rodman had command of the watertown arsenal, but in 1865 he went to Rock Island, where he constructed an arsenal on
 Government Island. He was prornot7 ed to the rank of 1ieutenant-colonel in 1887, and died at Rock Island.
 Ill, in 1871.
 Since Rodman's time great ad- vance has been made in artillery and the giant guns of his invention would seem tiny and crude affairs compared with the output of the Krupp factory
 and the Le Creusot gun works. The Rodnan system was. superseded in the |
 forged steel system. while the crusher
 guage replaced the Rodman, and his l mammoth powder soon passed into the limbo of forgotten things. The 15-inch Rodman smooth-bore was
 relegated many years ago to the pro-
 tection of minor waterways and com parative1y unimportant coast de-
 lenses. but even for these purposes
 the carriage was altered for more rapid manipulation and for the firing of 450-pound solid shot with a charge of 13o pounds of sphero-hexagonaI powder.
 As the civil war resulted in great i'm pr rovements in American artillery.
 sd the Franco-Prussian war inaug-
 urated a new era in European can
 non making. The steel guns nanufac-
 tured by the Krupp works did terri
 blet execution in the siege of Paris,
 and. started all the European powers
 to buying or making great steel guns.
 A quarter of a century ago the Krupp
 works turned out a gun weighing 1855
 tons for the Russian government, but
 even this giant instrument for dealing
 death and destruction, although com sidered marvel at that time, was a pygmy compared to the giant guns
 since cast by the Krupp factory.