An Account Of The Bell Rock Light House Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle version is available to download in english. Read online anytime anywhere directly from your device. Click on the download button below to get a free pdf file of An Account Of The Bell Rock Light House book. This book definitely worth reading, it is an incredibly well-written.
An Account of the Bell Rock Lighthouse by Robert Stevenson Pdf
Bell Rock, a small outcrop lying just below the roiling waves of the North Sea, had long been the site of smashed ships and doomed sailors, with an estimated 6 shipwrecks per year as the 18th century drew to a close. With the need for navigational warning, Robert Stevenson took command of the planning and construction of what would become the legendary Bell Rock Lighthouse. In his Account, Stevenson details the monumental task of building a structure to stand up to the ferocity of the open ocean, using revolutionary engineering and construction techniques, on a rock only visible a few hours a day at low tide.
The Craftsman Series: The Bell Rock Lighthouse by Robert Stevenson Pdf
This 1931 book is comprised of extracts from An Account of the Bell Rock Lighthouse (1824) by Robert Stevenson (1772-1850), a renowned Scottish civil engineer who specialised in the design and construction of lighthouses. A highly readable book that will be of value to anyone with an interest in civil engineering.
Notes on the Natural History of the Bell Rock by J. M. Campbell Pdf
In consequence probably of my connection of more than fifty years with the Northern Lighthouse Board, and of the almost equally long service of my father, I have been requested, and with much diffidence have complied with the request, to write, by way of Introduction to these very interesting and instructive “Notes from the Bell Rock,” a few words regarding Lighthouses, and a short account of the Northern Lighthouse Service and its Lightkeepers. My love for that service, and the esteem I have for those responsible and patient watchmen of the night, whose duty it is to keep their lights burning to guard the mariner from some of the dangers to which he is exposed, and to guide him on his way over the vasty deep, may possibly enable me to say something to interest readers of the Notes in a service whose appropriate motto is “In Salutem Omnium.” The origin, as well as the early history, of lighthouses is involved in much obscurity, although we learn from ancient writers that lights of some sort, or beacon fires, were used for guiding vessels or warning them of danger at least three hundred years before the Christian era. The Colossus of Rhodes and the Pharos of Alexandria are those that we first read of, but very little authentic information is to be got regarding them. At a much later date we know that sea lights for such purposes were produced by the burning of wood and coal in chauffers on coasts where they could be well seen. One such beacon fire was shown from a tower on the Isle of May, at the entrance to the Firth of Forth, from the year 1635 till 1816, when the present lighthouse was built, and is supposed to have been the first sea light on the coast of Scotland. It is not unlikely, however, that long before that date some of the most dangerous parts of the Mediterranean were lighted in a like primitive manner. The first lighthouse of any note of which we have authentic record is the Tour de Corduan, near the mouth of the river Garonne, in the south-west of France, which was founded in 1584, but not completed and lighted till 1610. On account of the style and grandeur of its architecture, it was long regarded as one of the wonders of the world, the Pharos of Alexandria having been regarded as another. Its lightroom was originally constructed for the combustion of wood in a kind of chauffer raised six feet above the floor of the lantern; but it has undergone many alterations and improvements since then, to bring it into keeping with the progressing and modern system of lighthouse illumination, which has made great strides during the last half-century.
For centuries the seas around Scotland were notorious for shipwrecks. Mariners' only aids were skill, luck, and single coal-fire light on the east coast, which was usually extinguished by rain. In 1786 the Northern Lighthouse Trust was established, with Robert Stevenson appointed as chief engineer a few years later. In this engrossing book, Bella Bathhurst reveals that the Stevensons not only supervised the construction of the lighthouses under often desperate conditions but also perfected a design of precisely chiseled interlocking granite blocks that would withstand the enormous waves that batter these stone pillars. The same Stevensons also developed the lamps and lenses of the lights themselves, which "sent a gleam across the wave" and prevented countless ships from being lost at sea. While it is the writing of Robert Louis Stevenson that brought fame to the family name, this mesmerizing account shows how his extraordinary ancestors changed the shape of the Scotland coast against incredible odds and with remarkable technical ingenuity.
Lighthouses have always unsettled and attracted in equal measure, highlighting the triumphs and failures in humanity's battle with the forces of nature. Taking as its heroes the lighthouses themselves, Sentinels of the Sea describes the engineering genius that allowed their construction on even the smallest of rock outcrops and the innovations that made the lights so powerful and reliable. Intricate, elegant architectural plans and elevations, and evocative period drawings and photographs showcase the innovative designs and technologies behind fifty historic lighthouses built around the world from the 17th to the 20th century. R.G. Grant's engaging and authoritative text chronicles the incredible feats of engineering and endurance that brought these iconic, isolated towers into being, the advances in lens technology that made the lights so effective, and the everyday routines of the lighthouse keepers and the heroic rescues that some performed. Packed with extraordinary stories of human endeavour, desperate shipwrecks, builders defying the elements and heroic sea rescues, the book also reveals the isolation and vulnerability of the dedicated lighthouse keepers.
Lighthouses are striking totems of our relationship to the sea. For many, they encapsulate a romantic vision of solitary homes amongst the waves, but their original purpose was much more utilitarian than that. Today we still depend upon their guiding lights for the safe passage of ships. Nowhere is this truer than in the rock lighthouses of Great Britain and Ireland which form a ring of twenty towers built between 1811 and 1904, so-called because they were constructed on desolate rock formations in the middle of the sea, and made of granite to withstand the power of its waves. Seashaken Housesis a lyrical exploration of these singular towers, the people who risked their lives building and rebuilding them, those that inhabited their circular rooms, and the ways in which we value emblems of our history in a changing world.