page_title: Science and invention in Birmingham
section_title: 19th century
hierarchical_section_title: Science and invention in Birmingham / 19th century
caption_attribution_description: English: Decorations on LB&amp;SCR B1 class no. 214 Gladstone to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Victoria of the United Kingdom, National Railway Museum, York
context_page_description: Birmingham is one of England's principal industrial centres and has a history of industrial and scientific innovation. It was once known as 'city of a thousand trades' and in 1791, Arthur Young described Birmingham as "the first manufacturing town in the world". Right up until the mid-19th century Birmingham was regarded as the prime industrial urban town in Britain and perhaps the world, the town's rivals were more specific in their trade bases. Mills and foundries across the world were helped along by the advances in steam power and engineering that were taking place in the city. The town offered a vast array of industries and was the world's leading manufacturer of metal ware, although this was by no means the only trade flourishing in the town.
  By the year 2000, of the 4,000 inventions copyrighted annually in the UK, 2,800 came from within a 35-mile radius of Birmingham. Peter Colegate of the Patent Office stated that "Every year, Birmingham amazes us by coming up with thousands of inventions. It is impossible to explain but people in the area seem to have a remarkable ability to come up with, and have the dedication to produce, ideas."
context_section_description: 1802: The exterior of the Soho Foundry is lit with gas lighting by William Murdoch. Murdoch, its developer, worked for Matthew Boulton and James Watt at Soho. This becomes the basis for Birmingham's immense gas industry, which incorporates many products and trades that rely on gas to work.
  1811: Henry James takes out a patent for propelling vessels by steam, via a paddle wheel fixed in the middle of the stern and steered by two fins to relieve leggers from the arduous duty of pushing boats through canal tunnels.
  1814: Thomas Dobbs (actor) invents a reaping machine, which consists of a circular saw or sickle; the grain is drawn or fed up to the saw by means of a pair of rollers. This predates William Bell's straw cutting machine.
  1821: Emanuel Heaton, gun finisher, takes out a patent for a watertight pan for gun locks.
  1823: Francis Deakin improves a method of stringing the piano by employing the screw and nut as opposed to the previously used wooden peg, thus allowing a greater tension and strength of wire.
  1824: American inventor William Church patents a printing machine in his Birmingham works, which positions the paper sheets more accurately. He is a prolific inventor, taking out numerous patents for methods of button making, nail making, metal working, smelting iron, spinning and other branches of engineering.
  1824: John Cadbury begins selling tea, coffee, and drinking chocolate, which he produces himself, at Bull Street. He later moves into the production of a variety of cocoa and drinking chocolates, made in a factory in Bridge Street and sold mainly to the wealthy because of the high cost of production. John Cadbury becomes a partner with his brother Benjamin and the company they form is called 'Cadbury Brothers of Birmingham'.
  The brothers open an office in London and in 1854 they receive the Royal Warrant as manufacturers of chocolate and cocoa to Queen Victoria. In the 1850s the industry receives a much needed boost, with the reduction in the high import taxes on cocoa, allowing chocolate to be more affordable to everybody. Cadbury's later becomes one of the largest chocolate manufacturers in the world and is still in production across the world today with a major production plant in Bournville.
  1828: Josiah Mason improves a cheap, efficient slip-in nib that can be added to a fountain pen.
  1830: With the invention of a new machine, William Joseph Gillott, John Mitchell and James Stephen Perry devise a way to mass-produce robust, cheap steel pen nibs. This boosts the Birmingham pen trade and by the 1850s, Birmingham exists as a world centre for steel pen and steel nib manufacture; more than half the steel-nib pens manufactured in the world are made in Birmingham. Thousands of skilled craftsmen and -women are employed in the industry. Many new manufacturing techniques are perfected, enabling the city's factories to mass-produce their pens cheaply and efficiently. These are sold worldwide to many who previously cannot afford to write, thus encouraging the development of education and literacy.
  1830s: Thomas Ridgway begins trading in the Bull Ring, selling tea. Ridgway later goes bankrupt. Setting up business in London, he pays back all of his creditors and continues his tea trade, becoming one of the first English tea companies to hygienically prepack tea so as to avoid adulteration. In 1876, Queen Victoria commands House of Ridgways to create a blend for her own personal use.
  1832: Muntz metal is patented, an alpha-beta brass with about 40% zinc and 60% copper. Its original use is as a replacement for the copper lining placed on the bottom of boats as it maintains the anti-fouling abilities of the pure form.
  It costs around two-thirds that of pure copper and has identical properties for this application, it becomes the material of choice and Muntz makes his fortune. A notable use of Muntz Metal is in the hull of the Cutty Sark.
  1832: William Chance, owner of a Birmingham iron merchants, invests in his brothers failing glass works in nearby Smethwick. After saving the company, this partnership later becomes the Ch
caption: One of William Stroudley's locomotives. Stroudley spent seven years studying in Birmingham under John Inshaw before becoming one of Britain's most famous steam locomotive engineers.
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