Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Isambard Kingdom Brunel (Encore)

Episode Date: June 7, 2021

In 2002 the BBC did a poll where they named the top 100 Britons in history. It had many people you have probably heard of, including Isaac Newton, Princess Diana, John Lenon, and Queen Victoria. The person who was ranked #2, however, is someone that many people outside of the UK might not have heard of. Yet, he really is one of the most important people when it came to the development of the modern world. Learn more about Isambard Kingdom Brunel on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The following is an encore presentation of everything everywhere daily. I'll be back again tomorrow with a brand new show. In 2002, the BBC did a poll where they named the top 100 Britons in history. It had many people you probably heard of, including Isaac Newton, Princess Diana, John Lennon, and Queen Victoria. The person who was ranked number two, however, is someone that many people outside of the UK might not have heard of. Yet he really is one of the most important people when it came to the development of the modern world. Learn more about Isambard Kingdom Brunel on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong?

ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed. It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the ThruLine podcast from NPR. This episode is sponsored by G Adventures. These are very troubled times. Even though things are starting to get better and more countries are opening up, people are still hesitant to travel, and that is totally understandable.

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The Travel with Confidence tours are available for booking today and we'll be departing from October 2, 2020 to the end of 2021. For more information and to book your tour, click on the link in the show notes. Isambard Kingdom Brunel was born in England in 1806. His unique name comes from his father's middle name, Isambard, and his mother's last name, kingdom. The name Isambard was prophetic, because it comes from the old high German word Eisenbarth, which means bright or shiny iron. His father, also an engineer, was a French immigrant who fled the French Revolution and moved to England. Growing up in London, he was taught by his father.

He was taught how to do engineering drawings at a very early age, and was doing Euclidean geometry by the age of eight. He was also fluent in both French and English. Isambard's parents ensured that he had the best education possible, and he was sent to the finest schools in France. Once he graduated and finished his apprenticeship with a master clockmaker, he returned to England where he began one of the most incredible careers in engineering history. In 1825, construction began on the Thames River Tunnel. This was the first ever tunnel to be dug underneath a body of water. His father was the chief engineer, and he was hired as an assistant engineer. The problems which they faced in digging the tunnel were numerous, as they were basically

cutting through loose gravel, which was underneath a river. Flooding was a constant danger, and many people died during the project. In 1828, a collapse in the tunnel killed two miners and almost killed Isambard. After the collapse, Isambard went to work on other projects, but the tunnel was completed by his father, and it is later used by the London Underground. The tunnel is still in use today. Sooner after he began work on designing the Clifton suspension bridge in Bristol, England. The bridge spanned 712 feet or 214 meters and was 249 feet or 76 meters above the River Avon. Construction began on the bridge in 1831, but they had to cease the project after riots broke out in Bristol, which caused funding to dry up. After Brunel's death, the bridge was completed based on

his design, and it was the longest span of any bridge in the world at its time of construction. The bridge is still in use today. The project for which Brunel is best known was the Great Western Railway. The Great Western Railway was a very ambitious project which linked London to the city of Bristol in southwest England. In Brunel's vision, a customer could take a train from London to Bristol, and then ones in Bristol board a ship to New York, all with the purchase of a single ticket. The GWR wasn't the first railway in England, but it was by far the best designed. The entire plan of the system was created by Brunel, which included everything from the route the track was laid on to the bridges, the tunnels, and even the stations. Brunel was obsessed with making the route as efficient as possible, which meant avoiding any unnecessary hills or valleys.

The railway was often called Brunel's billiard table for this reason. There were several different engineering challenges in designing the railway that he had to overcome. The box tunnel went through Box Hill on the route. It was built between 1838 and 1841 and was the longest railway tunnel in the world at the time of completion. It was built using nothing other than explosives and muscle. The workers went through a ton of candles per week, which was as much as the amount of explosives used. The construction of the tunnel was so precise that when workers from both sides met each other, their alignment was off by only two inches or 50 millimeters.

The tunnel is still in use today. The Warren Cliff Viaduct was the first structural. part of the railway to be completed, and was the first such structure to use hollow piers to hold up the arches. The viaduct is still in use today. The Maidenhead Railway Bridge had to cross the Thames using only two broad brick arches to allow river traffic to pass underneath. He wasn't allowed to put a pylon in the middle of the river. The design he created of a long sweeping arch that was larger than any other brick arch which had ever been created. Other engineers said it would collapse and that it was impossible. The design worked, and the bridge is still in use today. If you visited London,

you've probably experienced one of Brunel's designs without even knowing it. The London terminus for the Great Western Railway is Paddington Station. The station has grown significantly over the years, but the core of the station, which was designed by Brunel, is still in use today. If you take the Heathrow Express into London, which I highly recommend, you will arrive in Paddington Station, where, if you look closely, you can find a statue which was erected to Isimbard Kingdom Bernal. When the GWR mainline was complete, it took only about four hours to get from London to Bristol. The importance of the Great Western Railway can't be overstated. If you remember back to my episode on Time Zones, it was the Great Western Railway that ushered

in the use of time zones, as well as many other innovations, which later became the norm for railways around the world. You would think that having had a hand at the first tunnel to go under a river, the longest bridge in the world, the longest tunnel in the world, and a host of other innovations would be enough, but Brunel also had an enormous impact on another area of engineering, shipbuilding. He was responsible for the design of three ships, each of which was the largest ship in the world at the time of construction. The first was the SS Great Western, launched in April 8, 1838, and was a steamship designed to travel from Bristol to New York. Made out of wood and with a paddle wheel, it was the largest steam-powered ship in the world.

It arrived in New York 15 days and five hours after it left the port in England. It missed being the first steam shipped across the Atlantic by one day. Its rival ship, the SS Sirius, arrived before it, even though it had a four-day head start. The Sirius had to burn furniture and other wood aboard the ship to make it to New York, whereas the Great Western arrived with over a third of its coal unburned. His next great ship was the SS Great Britain. This is considered the first modern ship, launched in 1845. it was 322 feet or 98 meters long. Again, the largest ship in the world. However, there were two things

about this ship which were very different from the SS Great Western. First, its hull was made out of iron, not wood. Second, it was the first major transatlantic ship to use a propeller. Modern ship propellers are only 5% more efficient than the propeller used on the SS Great Britain. It made its first transatlantic crossing in 14 days and 21 hours. After a very odd and circuitous journey that involved being scuttled in the Falkland Islands, the ship was restored and now is in permanent dry dock in the city of Bristol. The final ship was the SS Great Eastern. Launched in 1858, the Great Eastern was 692 feet or 211 meters in length,

not only making it the largest ship in the world, but the largest ship for almost 40 years until the RMS Oceanic launched in 1890. It was six times larger than any other ship by volume at its time of development. Whereas the SS Great Britain had a hull made of iron, the Great Eastern was made entirely of iron. The Great Eastern was designed to travel to Australia non-stop without refueling. Financially, the ship was a disaster, as it never really found an audience for its purpose. However, if you remember back to my episode on the transatlantic cable, it eventually was repurposed as a cable-laying ship to help connect Europe and North America.

America by Telegraph. The Great Eastern eventually was sold for scrap, and the top of one of her mass is now all that remains as a flagpole outside of the Anfield Football Stadium in Liverpool. The Great Eastern was named one of the seven wonders of the industrial world in a 2003, after years of heavy smoking, Brunel died of a stroke in 1859 at the age of 53. His work left a lasting impact on the world, both through his creations, most of which are still in use today, and the legacy he left for other engineers. Years ago, when I first saw the BBC list, I didn't know who Isambard Kingdom Brunel was, and I wondered how he could be ranked as the second greatest Britain of all time. After learning about his story, I was left wondering why he wasn't ranked

number one. Executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is James Mackala. I want to read one of my newest reviews. Pat in Caliph said, short and fascinating. In a few short minutes, I learn interesting highlights of history, short, informative and fun, perfect for anyone interested in history and travel. Well, thank you very much, Pat, and thanks to all of you who leave a review over at Apple Podcasts because it really helps the show get discovered.