page_title: Benjamin Baker (engineer)
section_title: Early life and career
hierarchical_section_title: Benjamin Baker (engineer) / Early life and career
caption_attribution_description: Cleopatra’s Needle in London seen from the River Thames. In the background the New Adelphi, a monumental Art Deco building designed by the firm of Collcutt &amp; Hamp.in the 1930s For scale, a person is sat at the base of the Needle. Photographed by Adrian Pingstone in June 2005 and released to the public domain.
context_page_description: Sir Benjamin Baker KCB KCMG FRS FRSE was an eminent English civil engineer who worked in mid to late Victorian era. He helped develop the early underground railways in London with Sir John Fowler, but he is best known for his work on the Forth Bridge. He made many other notable contributions to civil engineering, including his work as an expert witness at the public inquiry into the Tay Rail Bridge disaster. Later, he helped design and build the first Aswan dam.
context_section_description: He was born in Keyford, which is now part of Frome, Somerset in 1840, the son of Benjamin Baker, principal assistant at Tondu Ironworks, and Sarah Hollis. There is a plaque on their house in Butts Hill. He was educated at Cheltenham Grammar School and, at the age of 16, became an apprentice at Messrs Price and Fox at the Neath Abbey Iron Works.  After his apprenticeship he spent two years as an assistant to Mr. W.H. Wilson. Later, he became associated with Sir John Fowler in London. He took part in the construction of the Metropolitan Railway (London). He was also a key expert witness in the Tay rail bridge disaster of 1879.
  He designed the cylindrical vessel in which Cleopatra's Needle, now standing on the Thames Embankment, London, was brought over from Egypt to England in 1877–1878.
  He obtained an extremely large professional practice, ranging over almost every branch of civil engineering, and was more or less directly concerned with most of the great engineering achievements of his day.
caption: Cleopatra's Needle from the River Thames, London
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Make": "OLYMPUS CORPORATION", "Image Model": "C750UZ", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Paint Shop Pro Photo 11.20", "Image DateTime": "2008:03:07 21:38:36", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "286", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1044", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "31447", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/650", "EXIF FNumber": "7/2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "50", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2005:06:09 13:55:10", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2005:06:09 13:55:10", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "17/5", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "67/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1923", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1476", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "902", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal"}