Corrugated Plate for Model Life Boat
date: label: Date made
content: mid-1840s
label: date made
content: ca 1846
name: label: patentee
content: Francis, Joseph
notes: label: Description
content: In the mid-1840s, Joseph Francis developed a new method for using steam-powered hydraulic presses to stamp large sheets of iron into corrugated shapes to make boat hulls. His 1845 patent model for the process does not survive, but he donated models of dies, and this sample copper sheet formed on them, to the Smithsonian in 1885.
label: Description
content: Joseph Francis experimented with boat construction methods throughout his life. In collaboration with the Novelty Iron Works in New York, he began to manufacture lifeboats, military cutters, and coastal rescue craft, as well as life preservers and similar gear, in the 1840s. His products proved popular among commercial steamship operators, life-saving stations, and the United States Navy. The Collins Line of express passenger ships, for example, adopted Francis lifeboats for its opulent ocean steamers in the 1850s. When the <I>Arctic</I> sank with great loss of life in 1854—but its patented metallic lifeboats survived—the company ordered more Francis boats for its remaining ships.
label: Description
content: Francis is best known today for designing an enclosed rescue craft called a life-car, the prototype for which is preserved by the Smithsonian. In 1848, the Patent Office denied him a patent for the life-car, saying it was already protected under Francis’s own 1845 patent.
topic: label: Subject
content: Naval History
label: related event
content: Expansion and Reform
setName: label: See more items in
content: Military and Society: Armed Forces History, Naval
label: See more items in
content: Transportation
label: Exhibition
content: On the Water
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Joseph Francis
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: AF.1645(14)
label: catalog number
content: 1645(14)
label: accession number
content: 16136
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Piece
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: corrugated metal (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1 1/2 in x 4 in x 7 in; 3.81 cm x 10.16 cm x 17.78 cm