Evening journal., 1915-02-04
New News Of Yesterday
The Man Who Perfected
the Turbine Wheel
By Holland.

George Westinghouse was the CEN
tral figure of a group Of distinguished
men of science who stood in front Of
the stupendous wheel pits which
constituted a part of the plant which
was in course of construction on the
banks Of the Niagara River in 1891.
This plant. e was expected, would
generate very great electric energy
by converting some part of the en-
ergy that is in the Niagara current
into electricity through the medium
OF the turbine wheel
All that Westinghouse at that time
predicted has since then been fulfilled.
He was especially interested in the
gigantic turbine wheels which had
been installed at the bottom of the
wheel pit. each one of which was ca
pable Of generation the equivalent Of
5000 horsepower electric energy be-
ing the apparatus which made the
conversion of the water power into
electric power possible.
Mr.. Westinghouse drew me little
TO one side Of the group and then
said that he regarded the perfecting
of the turbine as one of the most inn
portant Of the agencies in the devel-
opment of American industry. 81
don't know of anything more roman
tic or interesting than the story of the
development of the turbine Mr..
Westinghouse said. 1T was the work
OF an American and he was practic-
ally solf-ins,ructed. II was Boyden
a Massachusetts led. who a long time
ego showed how the turbine could sC
/ be improved as to make IL possible ia
/ utilize practically all of the energies
which are i'm watcrpower.
III an apparatus could be invented
Which would make IL possible 10 cap
/ iure and utilize substantially all oil
! the energy which is i'm coal the in
Cusiros of the world would be rev0-
| lutionized and no man could picture
/ 10 himself what an incOncciVably
great advantage to the material in
torests Of tho world an apparatus of
that kind would be-
II am much interested in turbines
not only from a business point of
view. but from that of science. Just
think Of ~ If We did not have tho
perfected turbine VIC could not build
such an electric plant as we are now
constructing at Niagara Falls. The
old fashioned water wheel did not
utilize much over 36 per cent Of tho
energy of watorpower. Some of the
wheels did better than others. Boy
den was. think. asked by the peo-
Pie who undertook to develop the
waterpower of the Merrimac River
where now stand the cities of Lowell
end of Lawrence II he could make q
better water wheel than any then IN
use Tho best wheels at that time
would moi yield more than 35 or Al
/ per cent Of the power that was
the waterfalls. A Fronchman had a
little earlier invented a turbine wheel
II was something of an advance upon
/ the old form of wheel. hut not much
Boyden spent a good while studying
that turbine and at last made up his
mind that he could so improve il as
TO make 1t capture practically all oil
the energy that is in the waterfalls
"Thoy thought he was promising
too much. but he did improve "a,
Turbine so that he was able to dc
nonstrate that it captured about ~
per cent of the power that is in in'
waterfalls. That demonstration mad,
the development of The manufaC.ur
he industry at Lowell and at Law
renee inevitable. But for Boydeni
Improvement not much maru;actur
ing would have been done there
There are going to be other improve
monts. especially in the utilization O
;hc energy that is IN steam. by tur
binos but after all Boyden's inven
7 j !
may be attributed much of tho growtl
of the manufacturing industry Of III
United States in those parts Of tn
country where waterpower is pienti
FIJI"
copyright 1915, by e. j. Edwards
All rights reserved.