Silvanus P. Thompson
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Astrochemist
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{{Infobox Scientist
|name = Silvanus Phillips Thompson
|box_width =
|image = Thompson_Silvanus_mature.jpg
|image_width = 150px
|caption = Silvanus Thompson (1851 - 1916)<ref>Photograph from Thompson's obituary in Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 1917-1918, vol. 94, pp xvi-xix. See also ''Silvanus Thompson, His Life and Letters'', Unwin, London, 1920 by Thompson and Thompson.</ref>
|birth_date = [[June 19]], [[1851]]
|birth_place = [[York]], [[England]]
|death_date = [[June 12]], [[1916]]
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|nationality = [[England]]
|ethnicity =
|field = [[physics]]
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|known_for = [[Calculus Made Easy]]
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'''Silvanus Phillips Thompson''' [[Fellow of the Royal Society|FRS]] ([[June 19]], [[1851]] – [[June 12]], [[1916]]) was a professor of physics at the City and Guilds Technical College in [[Finsbury]], [[England]]. He was elected to the [[Royal Society]] in [[1891]] and was known for his work as an [[electrical engineer]] and as an author. Thompson's most enduring publication is his [[1910]] text ''[[Calculus Made Easy]]'', which teaches the fundamentals of calculus, and is still available as a supplemental textbook.<ref>The original version is now in the public domain. A new edition has been updated and edited by [[Martin Gardner]].</ref> Thompson also wrote a popular physics text, ''Elementary Lessons in Electricity and Magnetism,''<ref>''Silvanus Phillips Thompson, radiology and the Röntgen Society'' by Adrian M K Thomas, British Society for the History of Radiology, Department of Radiology, Princess Royal University Hospital, Orpington, Kent BR6 8ND</ref> as well as biographies of [[Lord Kelvin]] and [[Michael Faraday]].
==Biography==
Silvanus Thompson was born in the year of the [[Great Exhibition]] of 1851 to a [[Quaker]] family in [[York]], [[England]]. His father served as a master at the Quaker School at Bootham in York. In 1873 Silvanus Thompson was made the science master at [[Bootham School]].
On February 11, 1876 he heard [[Sir William Crookes]] give an evening discourse at the [[Royal Institution]] on ''The Mechanical Action of Light'' when Crookes demonstrated his light mill or [[Crookes radiometer|radiometer]]. Thompson was intrigued and stimulated and developed a major interest in light and optics (his other main interest being [[electromagnetism]]). In 1876 he was appointed as a lecturer in [[Physics]] at [[University College, Bristol]], and later was made Professor in 1878 at the age of 27.
[[Image:Silvanus_Thompson_age_25.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Silvanus Thompson at age 25<ref>Photograph from ''Silvanus Thompson, His Life and Letters'', Unwin, London, 1920 by Thompson and Thompson.</ref>]]
A major concern of Thompson was the area of technical education and he made a series of continental tours to France, Germany and Switzerland to compare the continental approach to that in the UK. In 1879 he gave a paper at the [[Royal Society of Arts]] on ''Apprenticeship, Scientific and Unscientific'' in which he detailed the deficiencies in technical education in England. In the discussion, the opinion was expressed that England was too conservative to make use of trade schools and that continental methods would not be applicable in the UK. Thompson recognized that technical education was the means by which scientific knowledge could be put into action and spent the rest of his life putting his vision into practical realization.
In [[1878]] the [[City and Guilds of London Institute]] for the Advancement of Technical Education was founded. [[Finsbury]] Technical College was a teaching institution created by the City and Guilds Institute and it was as its Principal and Professor of Physics that Thompson was to devote the next 30 years.
Thompson’s particular gift was in his ability to communicate difficult scientific concepts in a clear and interesting manner. He attended and lectured at the Royal Institution giving the [[Royal Institution Christmas Lectures|Christmas lectures]] in [[1896]] on ''Light, Visible and Invisible'' with an account of [[Röntgen]] Light. He was an impressive lecturer and the radiologist AE Barclay said that: “None who heard him could forget the vividness of the word-pictures he placed before them.”
[[Image:Silvanus_Thompson_lecturing.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Silvanus Thompson lecturing at the Royal Institution<ref>Photograph from ''Silvanus Thompson, His Life and Letters'', Unwin, London, 1920 by Thompson and Thompson.</ref>]]
Thompson repeated Röntgen's experiments on the day after the discovery was announced in the UK and following this gave the first public demonstration of the new rays at the [[Clinical Society of London]] on March 30, 1896. [[William Hale White]] said: “The audience was thrilled, most seeing for the first time actual pieces of bones and metal. Silvanus Thompson was a prince among lecturers. I have never heard a better demonstration or attended a more memorable medical meeting.”
He was the first President of the Röntgen Society (later to become the [[British Institute of Radiology]]<ref>[http://www.aim25.ac.uk/cgi-bin/search2?coll_id=7259&inst_id=81] and [http://www.bir.org.uk/ British Institute of Radiology]</ref>). He described the society as being between medicine, physics and photography. It was his genius that put its stamp on that society and has made it into the rich amalgam of medical, scientific and technical members that it is today. As he said in his presidential address to the Röntgen Society: “The pioneers have opened the way into the wilderness; they are now being followed by those who will occupy the new territory, complete its survey, and map out its features. Not until every corner is explored and charted will the work of our Society be ended.”
In 1900 Thompson was involved in the unworthy [[Whitehall|Whitehall]] attack on [[Guglielmo Marconi|Marconi]]'s patents, when the [[Post Office (United Kingdom)|Post Office]] commissioned both him and [[Oliver Joseph Lodge|Professor Oliver Lodge]] to produce secret reports. The purpose was either to declare the [[Marconi Company|Marconi Company]] patents invalid, or to produce similar, but technically different equipment: the latter involved Thompson. When the [[Admiralty|Admiralty]] received the two reports it was the pioneer of wireless telegraphy Captain H Jackson, then commanding HMS Vulcan, whose opinion led a senior naval officer to report, "it would be unworthy to try to evade the Marconi Company's patent."
Thompson was committed to truth in all aspects and his 1915 [[Swarthmore]] Lecture delivered to the [[Society of Friends]] was ''The Quest for Truth'', indicating his belief in truth and integrity in all aspects of our lives. Thompson remained an active member of the [[Religious Society of Friends]], throughout his life<ref> ''[[Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]]'' article by Arthur Smithells, ‘Thompson, Silvanus Phillips (1851–1916)’, revised by Graeme J. N. Gooday, online edn, May 2006 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/36496], accessed 8 Dec 2006 </ref>
==Literary works==
Thompson wrote many books of a technical nature particularly ''Elementary Lessons in Electricity & Magnetism'' ([[1890]]), ''Dynamo Electrical Machinery'' ([[1896]]) and the classic ''Calculus Made Easy'' which was first published in [[1910]], and is still in print.
Thompson had many interests including painting, literature, the history of science, and working in his greenhouse. He wrote biographies of [[Michael Faraday]] and [[Lord Kelvin]]. He also wrote about [[William Gilbert]], the Elizabethan physician, and produced an edition of Gilbert’s ''De Magnete'' at the Chiswick Press in [[1900]]. In 1912, Thompson published the first English translation of ''Treatise on Light'' by [[Christian Huygens]].
His scientific library of historical and working books is preserved at the [[Institution of Electrical Engineers]] and is a wonderful collection (he was President of the IEE). It includes many classic books on [[electricity]], [[magnetism]] and [[optics]]. The collection consists of 900 rare books and 2500 nineteenth and early twentieth century titles, with approximately 200 autograph letters.
==Miscellanea==
* The first publication of Thompson's ''Calculus Made Easy'' listed only "FRS" as the author.<ref>See Thompson's obituary in Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 1917-1918, vol. 94, pp xvi-xix and also A. C. Lynch's "Silvanus Thompson: teacher, researcher, historian" in IEE Proceedings, vol. 136, A(6), pp 306-312.</ref>
* Thompson is one of the individuals represented on the [http://rpec.co.uk/engineerswalk/st_walk.html Engineers Walk] in Bristol, England.
* Thompson appears as a character in [[Edison's Conquest of Mars]], where he voyages to Mars along with a number of other prominent scientists of his period to fight the Martians from [[War of the Worlds]].
* Thompson was elected a [[Fellow of the Royal Society]] in 1891.<ref>See the Royal Society's [http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?id=1727 web page] for the date or Thompson's election to membership.</ref>
==Notes==
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==Further reading==
Sorted by date.
* Obituary in Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 1917-1918, vol. 94, pp xvi-xix
* Obituary in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 1917, vol. 77, pp 305-307 - [http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-iarticle_query?1917MNRAS..77..305. Online at ADS]
* Thompson, J. S. and Thompson, H. G., [http://www.archive.org/details/silvanusphillips00thomrich ''Silvanus Thompson, His Life and Letters''], Unwin, London, 1920.
* Lynch, A. C., "Silvanus Thompson: teacher, researcher, historian," IEE Proceedings, 1989, vol. 136, A(6), pp 306-312.
* Gay, H. and Barrett, A., "Should the Cobbler Stick to his Last? Silvanus Phillips Thompson and the Making of a Scientific Career," British Journal for the History of Science, 2002, vol. 35, 151-86
* {{Cite journal
| last = Shipley
| first = Brian C
| title = Gilbert, Translated: Silvanus P. Thompson, the Gilbert Club, and the Tercentenary Edition of De Magnete
| journal = Canadian Journal of History
| year = 2003
| month = August
| url = http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3686/is_200308/ai_n9252195
}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thompson, S.P.}}
[[Category:1851 births]]
[[Category:1916 deaths]]
[[Category:People from York]]
[[Category:English academics]]
[[Category:British electrical engineers]]
[[Category:English Quakers]]
[[Category:Fellows of the Royal Society]]
[[de:Silvanus Phillips Thompson]]