Bidder, George Parker

Born in Mortonhampstead, Devon , on June 13, 1806, in a mason family named William Bidder. From childhood, he was distinguished by his extraordinary ability to perform oral calculations, as a result of which his father brought him to fairs, first local ones, and after he reached the age of six, all over the country, where those who, having paid in advance, could experience the extraordinary abilities of the child. His talent brought his father profit, but his education as such in the family was neglected.

However, the talented boy was noticed by physicist and astronomer John Herschel , who took him from his father and placed him in a school in Cumberwell, from where he was soon taken back by his father, who wanted to continue to earn money on him. However, thanks to the intervention of Henry Jardine, he was again rid of his father, this time forever, and was able to attend lectures at the University of Edinburgh .

After graduating from university in 1824, he became a military topographer, but gradually plunged into engineering work. In 1834, Robert Stephenson , whom he met in Edinburgh, offered him a job in London at the London and Birmingham Railway , where over the next two years he began to help George Stephenson in his work, which at that time designed railroad schemes between London and Brighton and between Manchester and Rugby via Potteris.

Subsequently, George became an inventor or innovator in several areas of technology at once: methods of railway transportation, hydraulic engineering, actively promoted the development of electric telegraph and trawlers powered by steam engines ^[1] .

• This article (section) contains text taken (translated) from the eleventh edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica , which went into the public domain .