James Watt was a Scottish inventor, mechanical engineer, and chemist who improved on Thomas Newcomen's 1712 Newcomen steam engine with his Watt steam engine in 1776, which was fundamental to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution in both his native Great Britain and the rest of the world.
The Lunar Society of Birmingham was a British dinner club and informal learned society of prominent figures in the Midlands Enlightenment, including industrialists, natural philosophers and intellectuals, who met regularly between 1765 and 1813 in Birmingham. At first called the Lunar Circle, "Lunar Society" became the formal name by 1775. The name arose because the society would meet during the full moon, as the extra light made the journey home easier and safer in the absence of street lighting. The members cheerfully referred to themselves as "lunaticks", a pun on lunatics. Venues included Erasmus Darwin's home in Lichfield, Matthew Boulton's home, Soho House, Bowbridge House in Derbyshire, and Great Barr Hall.
William Murdoch was a Scottish engineer and inventor.
Matthew Boulton was an English manufacturer and business partner of Scottish engineer James Watt. In the final quarter of the 18th century, the partnership installed hundreds of Boulton & Watt steam engines, which were a great advance on the state of the art, making possible the mechanisation of factories and mills. Boulton applied modern techniques to the minting of coins, striking millions of pieces for Britain and other countries, and supplying the Royal Mint with up-to-date equipment.
Soho House is a museum run by Birmingham Museums Trust, celebrating Matthew Boulton's life, his partnership with James Watt, his membership of the Lunar Society of Birmingham and his contribution to the Midlands Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. It is a Grade II* listed 18th-century house in Handsworth, part of Birmingham since 1911, but historically in the county of Staffordshire. It was the home of entrepreneur Matthew Boulton from 1766 until his death in 1809, and a regular meeting-place of the Lunar Society.
Smethwick is an industrial town in Sandwell, West Midlands, England, historically in Staffordshire. It lies four miles west of Birmingham city centre, and borders West Bromwich and Oldbury to the north and west. Formerly a Staffordshire county borough, Smethwick is situated near the edge of Sandwell metropolitan borough and borders the Birmingham districts of Handsworth, Winson Green, Harborne, Edgbaston and Quinton to the south and east, as well as the Black Country towns of West Bromwich and Oldbury in the north and west.
Handsworth is a suburban town and also an inner-city, urban area of northwest Birmingham in the West Midlands. Historically in Staffordshire, Handsworth lies just outside Birmingham City Centre.
Soho is an area that is in Central Birmingham and Smethwick, approximately 2 miles north west of Birmingham city centre on the A41. The name is an abbreviation of South House, denoting that it was located to the south of Handsworth. The section of the A41 separating Handsworth from Winson Green is known as Soho Road.
Boulton & Watt was an early British engineering and manufacturing firm in the business of designing and making marine and stationary steam engines. Founded in the English West Midlands around Birmingham in 1775 as a partnership between the English manufacturer Matthew Boulton and the Scottish engineer James Watt, the firm had a major role in the Industrial Revolution and grew to be a major producer of steam engines in the 19th century.
The Soho Manufactory was an early factory which pioneered mass production on the assembly line principle, in Soho, Birmingham, England, at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. It operated from 1766–1848 and was demolished in 1853.
Sir Richard Trevithick Tangye was a British manufacturer of engines and other heavy equipment.
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.
Handsworth Wood is an affluent suburban area in Northwest Birmingham, England.
Matthew Murray was an English steam engine and machine tool manufacturer, who designed and built the first commercially viable steam locomotive, the twin cylinder Salamanca in 1812. He was an innovative designer in many fields, including steam engines, machine tools and machinery for the textile industry.
St Mary's Church, Handsworth, also known as Handsworth Old Church, is a Grade II* listed Anglican church in Handsworth, Birmingham, England. Its ten-acre (4 hectare) grounds are contiguous with Handsworth Park. It lies just off the Birmingham Outer Circle, and south of a cutting housing the site of the former Handsworth Wood railway station. It is noteworthy as the resting place of famous progenitors of the industrial age, and has been described as "the cathedral of the Industrial Revolution".
Samuel Wyatt was an English architect and engineer. A member of the Wyatt family, which included several notable 18th- and 19th-century English architects, his work was primarily in a neoclassical style.
Old Bess is an early beam engine built by the partnership of Boulton and Watt. The engine was constructed in 1777 and worked until 1848.
Matthew Piers Watt Boulton, also published under the pseudonym M. P. W. Bolton, was a British classicist, elected member of the UK's Metaphysical Society, an amateur scientist and an inventor, best known for his invention of the aileron, a primary aeronautical flight control device. He patented the aileron in 1868, some 36 years before it was first employed in manned flight by Robert Esnault-Pelterie in 1904.
Albion Mills was a steam-powered flour mill situated on the southeastern side of Blackfriars Bridge in northern Southwark, London, then in the parish of Christchurch, Surrey. Matthew Boulton began plans for the mill as early as 1783; it was completed in 1786, and gutted by fire in 1791. Most of the notable engineering drawings and depictions of Albion Mills are in the Birmingham Central Library.
Paula Woof is a British artist, best known as a painter, sculptor, muralist, mosaicist and art teacher. She has a number of works of public art, some in her on name and some made collaboratively with other artists, on display in the English Midlands.
