Energy
The Steam Engine and the Mechanization of Labor
From pumping water out of English mines to driving locomotives, the steam engine was the work of many hands and gave industry power independent of rivers and muscle.
Technology area
Energy
The history of machines is also the history of how power is obtained and distributed. The energy area follows the shift from human and animal effort to steam and then to electricity, looking not only at the invention of devices but at the construction of entire systems of generation and distribution.
Articles
Energy
How Electricity Moved from the Laboratory to Everyday Life
Electricity went from laboratory curiosity to a system of generation and distribution through many inventors, engineers, and commercial and patent disputes.
Milestones
- 1712
Newcomen's atmospheric engine
Thomas Newcomen installs a steam engine in England to drain mines. James Watt's improvements follow from the 1760s.
Read: Steam engine → - 1800
Volta's pile
Alessandro Volta describes the pile, the first stable source of continuous electric current.
Read: Electricity → - 1831
Electromagnetic induction
Michael Faraday demonstrates induction, the basis of generators and motors. Joseph Henry observed similar phenomena independently.
Read: Electricity → - 1882
First urban electric grids
Stations such as Holborn Viaduct in London and Pearl Street in New York begin distributing electricity for lighting.
Read: Electricity →