Excerpt from Dreams and Visions of an Engineer

The author of this little volume Opened his eyes to the light of this world July 25, 1839, on the old Smades home stead on the bank of the St. Lawrence river, three miles from Prescott, in Ontario, Canada. He was the youngest of a family of seven children, four girls and three boys. At the age of eight years his father and mother had both passed away and he went to make his home with an uncle who was a farmer. Here the lad developed into a husky youth, who, reaping and binding in the harvest fields, kept up with the fastest cradlers. Early in life his mechanical ability was demonstrated, and at the age of sixteen he left the fields for the city, where he went into the Shop of James Turmbull, a skilled ironworker and blacksmith. After a year in this place, the youth could forge as good a horse shoe or nail as the masters of the art, and he began to look about for another line of work. It was while in this shop he decided to be an engineer. With longing eyes he had watched the steamboats plying up and down the St. Law rence river. They seemed calling him, and answering the call he crossed the river and in the shops at Ogdensburg began the schooling for his life work. He worked in a num ber of different places before finishing his mechanical edu cation, one of them a great concern in New York where he helped build the ponderous engines for the sea-goingsteamships of that day. He was yet scarce more than a youth when he had received his papers and was first en gineer on one of the steamers of the Great Lakes. After some years of engineer service in the North and East, he went to the great Southwest, where he put in some of the largest mills in this vast new timber region. Later he went into the machinery and manufacturing business for himself. As an engineer his service to his fellow men was not only that of a constructive force in the world of industry, but a force in the moral world. With pen and purse he fought the legalized Liquor Traffic until the day of its downfall. During the years his travels have been wide and his days crowded with toil. Yet he has given expression to some of the thoughts that have come to him. From a consider able accumulation of printed verse and unprinted frag ments, written sometimes beside the work bench with toil stained hands, and sometimes in far places to fill lonely hours, the matter which has been selected is left herewith.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.