List: Scottish inventors

by likeorhate

•  Alexander Graham Bell

  Alexander Graham Bell (March 3, 1847 – August 2, 1922) was an eminent scientist, inventor, engineer and innovator who is credited with inventing the first practical telephone. Bell's father, grandfather, and brother had all been associated with work on elocution and speech, and both his mother and wife were deaf, profoundly influencing Bell's life's work.

  

  32.3%
  

  33.1%
  

  34.6%
  
•  David Brewster

  Sir David Brewster FRS (11 December 1781 – 10 February 1868) was a Scottish physicist, mathematician, astronomer, inventor, and writer.

  

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  80.0%
  

  20.0%
  
•  John Napier

  John Napier of Merchistoun (1550 – 4 April 1617) – also signed as Neper, Nepair – named Marvellous Merchiston, was a Scottish mathematician, physicist, astronomer & astrologer, and also the 8th Laird of Merchistoun. He was the son of Sir Archibald Napier of Merchiston. John Napier is most renowned as the inventor of the logarithm, and of an invention called "Napier's bones". Napier also made common the use of the decimal point in arithmetic and mathematics.

  

  40.0%
  

  40.0%
  

  20.0%
  
•  James Clerk Maxwell

  James Clerk Maxwell (13 June 1831 – 5 November 1879) was a Scottish theoretical physicist and mathematician. His most important achievement was classical electromagnetic theory, synthesizing all previously unrelated observations, experiments and equations of electricity, magnetism and even optics into a consistent theory.

  

  50.0%
  

  35.7%
  

  14.3%
  
•  James Watt

  James Watt, FRS, FRSE (19 January 1736 – 25 August 1819) was a Scottish inventor and mechanical engineer whose improvements to the Newcomen steam engine were fundamental to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution in both the Kingdom of Great Britain and the world.

  

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  0.0%
  

  100.0%
  
•  John James Richard Macleod

  John James Rickard Macleod (6 September 1876 – 16 March 1935) was a Scottish physician and physiologist. He was noted as one of the co-discoverers of insulin and given the Nobel Medal for this discovery.

  

  25.0%
  

  20.0%
  

  55.0%
  
•  William Kennedy Dickson

  William Kennedy Laurie Dickson (3 August 1860 – 28 September 1935) was a French-Anglo-Scottish inventor who devised an early motion picture camera under the employ of Thomas Edison (post-dating the work of Louis Le Prince).

  

  40.0%
  

  30.0%
  

  30.0%
  
•  William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin

  William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin (or Lord Kelvin), OM, GCVO, PC, PRS, PRSE, (26 June 1824 – 17 December 1907) was a Belfast-born mathematical physicist and engineer. At the University of Glasgow he did important work in the mathematical analysis of electricity and formulation of the first and second Laws of Thermodynamics, and did much to unify the emerging discipline of physics in its modern form.

  

  22.2%
  

  27.8%
  

  50.0%
  
•  Robert Watson-Watt

  Sir Robert Alexander Watson-Watt, KCB, FRS, FRAeS (13 April 1892 – 5 December 1973) is considered by many to be the "inventor of radar". (The hyphenated name is used herein for consistency, although this was not adopted until he was knighted in 1942.

  

  33.3%
  

  33.3%
  

  33.3%
  
•  John Logie Baird

  John Logie Baird (14 August 1888 – 14 June 1946) was a Scottish engineer and inventor of the world's first working television system, also the world's first fully electronic colour television broadcast. Although Baird's electromechanical system was eventually displaced by purely electronic systems, his early successes demonstrating working television broadcasts and his colour and cinema television work earn him a prominent place in television's invention.

  

  44.4%
  

  11.1%
  

  44.4%
  
•  Charles Macintosh

  Charles Macintosh (29 December 1766 – 25 July 1843) was a British chemist and inventor of waterproof fabrics. The Mackintosh raincoat (the variant spelling is now standard) is named for him.

  

  33.3%
  

  33.3%
  

  33.3%
  
•  James Dewar

  Sir James Dewar FRS (20 September 1842 – 27 March 1923) was a British chemist and physicist. He is probably best-known today for his invention of the Dewar flask, which he used in conjunction with extensive research into the liquefaction of gases. He was also particularly interested in atomic and molecular spectroscopy, working in these fields for more than 25 years.

  

  25.0%
  

  50.0%
  

  25.0%
  
•  William Murdoch

  William Murdoch (sometimes spelled Murdock) (21 August 1754 – 15 November 1839) was a Scottish engineer and inventor. It is believed he Anglicised his name to Murdock when he moved to England. Murdoch was employed by the firm of Boulton and Watt and worked for them in Cornwall as a steam engine erector for ten years, spending most of the rest of his life in Birmingham. He was the inventor of gas lighting in the early 1790s and coined the term gasometer.

  

  100.0%
  

  0.0%
  

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•  James Bowman Lindsay

  James Bowman Lindsay (8 September 1799 - 29 June 1862) was a Scottish inventor and author. He is credited with early developments in several fields, such as incandescent lighting and telegraphy.

  

  16.7%
  

  16.7%
  

  66.7%
  
•  Fleeming Jenkin

  Henry Charles Fleeming Jenkin (25 March 1833 – 12 June 1885) was Professor of Engineering at the University of Edinburgh, remarkable for his versatility. Known to the world as the inventor of telpherage, he was an electrician and cable engineer, a lecturer, linguist, critic, actor, dramatist and artist. His descendants include the Tory MPs Patrick, Lord Jenkin of Roding and Bernard Jenkin.

  

  66.7%
  

  11.1%
  

  22.2%
  
•  James Nasmyth

  James Hall Nasmyth (sometimes spelled Naesmyth, Nasmith, or Nesmyth) (August 19, 1808 – May 7, 1890) was a Scottish engineer and inventor famous for his development of the steam hammer. He was the co-founder of Nasmyth, Gaskell and Company manufacturers of machine tools. He retired at the age of 48, and moved to Penshurst, Kent where he developed his hobbies of astronomy and photography.

  

  36.4%
  

  36.4%
  

  27.3%
  
•  John Loudon McAdam

  John Loudon McAdam (September 21, 1756 – November 26, 1836) was a Scottish engineer and road-builder. He invented a new process, "macadamisation", for building roads with a smooth hard surface that would be more durable and less muddy than soil-based tracks. Modern road construction still reflects McAdam's influence.

  

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  100.0%
  
•  James Gregory (mathematician)

  James Gregory FRS (November 1638 – October 1675) was a Scottish mathematician and astronomer. He described the first practical reflecting telescope - the Gregorian telescope - and made advances in trigonometry, discovering infinite series representations for several trigonometry functions.

  

  100.0%
  

  0.0%
  

  0.0%
  
•  William Boog Leishman

  Lieutenant-General Sir William Boog Leishman (November 6, 1865 - June 2, 1926) was a Scottish pathologist and British Army medical officer. He was Director-General of Army Medical Services from 1923 to 1926. He was born in Glasgow and attended Westminster School and the University of Glasgow and entered the Royal Army Medical Corps. He served in India, where he studied enteric fever and kala azar. He returned to the United Kingdom and was stationed at the Victoria Hospital in Netley in 1897.

  

  0.0%
  

  0.0%
  

  100.0%
  
•  James David Forbes

  James David Forbes FRS (20 April 1809 – 31 December 1868) was a Scottish physicist who worked extensively on the conduction of heat, seismology and glaciology. Forbes was a resident of Edinburgh for most of his life, educated at the University and a professor there from 1833 until he became principal of the United College of St. Andrews in 1859.

  

  33.3%
  

  66.7%
  

  0.0%
  
•  James Keir

  James Keir FRS (20 September 1735 – 11 October 1820) was a Scottish chemist, geologist, industrialist, and inventor, and an important member of the Lunar Society of Birmingham.

  

  0.0%
  

  0.0%
  

  100.0%
  
•  James Porteous

  James Porteous (1848-1922) was the Scottish-American inventor of the Fresno Scraper. James Porteous was born in Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland. His father, William Porteous, had been a wheelwright and blacksmith who built and repaired carriages, wagons and farm equipment. After learning his basic skills, James Porteous emigrated to the United States in 1873, at the age of 25, and settled in Santa Barbara, California.

  

  40.0%
  

  40.0%
  

  20.0%
  
•  John Boyd Dunlop

  John Boyd Dunlop (5 February 1840 – 23 October 1921), born in Scotland, was the inventor who was one of the founders of the rubber company that bore his name, Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company. He was born on a farm in Dreghorn, North Ayrshire, and studied to be a veterinary surgeon at the Dick Vet, University of Edinburgh, a profession he pursued for nearly ten years at home, moving to Downpatrick, Northern Ireland, in 1867.

  

  66.7%
  

  0.0%
  

  33.3%
  
•  James Young (Scottish chemist)

  James Young (13 July 1811 – 13 May 1883) was a Scottish chemist best known for his method of distilling paraffin from coal.

  

  100.0%
  

  0.0%
  

  0.0%
  
•  David Bruce (microbiologist)

  Sir David Bruce (May 29, 1855, Melbourne - November 27, 1931) was a Scottish pathologist and microbiologist who investigated the Malta-fever and trypanosomes, identifying the cause of sleeping sickness. He was born in Australia but returned with his family to Scotland at the age of 5. He was educated at Stirling High School and then studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh.

  

  50.0%
  

  0.0%
  

  50.0%