Maury
Klein’s book The Power Makers is
a history
of power from
the Thomas
Newcomen’s steam engine
to the foundations of America’s electric
grid.
Unlike many historians who look at the history of electric power, Klein
gives a lot of attention to steam. We haven’t had steam engines directly
powering industrial plants for decades, but steam turbines are still central to
the production of most electricity in the United States. Even nuclear
power plants use steam turbines to run their generators, they just use the heat
from nuclear reactions rather than from the combustion of coal or natural gas
to boil water
and heat the steam to more than a thousand degrees.
Klein gives attention to many lesser known names in the history of
power. He shows that Thomas Edison
and George
Westinghouse had rivals other than each other, such as Elihu Thomson.
Nikola Tesla
is well known as the genius who invented the AC motor, but other engineers
helped develop his prototype into a commercial product, such as mathematically
talented engineer Benjamin
Lamme. Many talented inventors tried their hands at making electric
lighting and power systems better. Only some of them had the vision, business
sense, good partners and luck to turn their ideas into successful products. Few
of them are widely known today.
Electrification had clear, direct effects in industry and
transportation. Klein discusses how it’s influence reached into other sectors
of the economy. Corporate management
and finance
changed to meet the needs of a growing new technology.
For instance, Edison General
Electric was able to take advantage of a new New Jersey
law that allowed corporations
to own businesses in other states. Electric companies grew, expanded and
consolidated through numerous mergers and acquisitions. They had a demand for
capital that nearly rivaled the railroads,
another transformative technology that had shortly preceded electric power.
As the availability of electricity grew, certain industries were able
to grow, too. Some chemical and metals manufacturing required abundant electric
power to catalyze chemical reactions or generate the high temperatures of
electric furnaces. Manufacturers flocked to Niagara after a
lager hydroelectric power station started operation there in 1895.
Klein brings the many thread of his story of power together by
reflections on three great fairs: the 1876
Centennial
Exhibition in Philadelphia,
the 1893 Columbian
Exposition in Chicago
and the 1939
New
York World’s Fair. In the first, a giant steam engine that powered exhibits
by means of belts and pulley was a significant attraction. By the second,
electricity was on display, and the White City
fairground was a model for testing AC power systems. By the 1939 fair, large
power utilities of the type we would recognize today were becoming common. By
then it was no big deal to flip a switch or pull a lever and get power so,
unlike the previous to fairs, no dignitary undertook a show of doing it; the
power was on from the start.
If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
Klein, Maury. The Power Makers:
Steam, Electricity, and the Men Who Invented Modern America. New York: Bloomsbury Press,
2008.
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