James Watt, Inventor of the Industrial Revolution

by Read Listen Learn


James Watt was born in Scotland in 1736. His father was quite a rich businessman and Watt’s childhood was comfortable. However, the boy was often sick and had very bad headaches. Because of his poor health, his mother taught him at home for many years.

When he finally went to school, his teachers did not think Watt was a special student. For example, he was bad at Latin and Greek, the most important subjects at university in those days. It was only mathematics where he did very well.

When Watt was eighteen, he went to London to become a maker of mathematical instruments. This was an important job at the time because Europe was beginning to show a real interest in science, but there was no equipment to make correct measurements. However, at first, Watt’s year in London did not help him. He returned to Scotland but could not start his shop because he needed seven years training. There was no mathematical instrument maker in Scotland and so he could not get that training. Luckily, the University of Glasgow needed someone to repair equipment and they gave the work to Watt. There he met important scientists who helped him with his later work.

In 1763, someone sent Watt a Newcomen steam engine to repair. This engine used steam to make mechanical energy to get water out of coal mines. He noticed that the engine needed to cool and heat the cylinder again and again. This meant that the machine needed a lot of energy and only worked slowly.

Watt made a new engine with a separate place to cool the steam. In this way, the machine worked faster and better and used less energy. Watt quickly became famous in Scotland and other parts of Britain and Europe.

But his most important work came in 1781, when he made a steam engine that did not need a chain to move the piston. The chain meant that the piston could only move up and down. Watt found that a wheel made it possible for the engine to use less coal.

For many years, this new invention was not possible because nobody could make the parts of the machine. Another difficulty for Watt was that he did not have enough money to play with his new ideas. He became partners with Matthew Boulton, a rich businessman, who saw that Watt’s ideas could make them both very rich men. He had the money that Watt needed to make new engines. Watt’s new engine could do a lot more than get water out of mines. They used it in factories to make machines go faster.

Watt was not a very good businessman and so his partnership with Matthew Boulton was very important to him. But he did have a very good idea for selling his machines. He thought about how much money factories needed to pay for horses to make the energy for their machines every year. He then decided the price of his engines. If a factory spent £10,000 a year on horses, Watt sold the machine for £10,000 ÷ 3, or £3,333 a year. This is why we still talk about ‘horsepower’ (or HP) in car engines today.

James Watt was not only a technician. He was also interested in the science that made his machines work. He met other thinkers of his time at the Lunar Society of Birmingham. They came together to eat dinner and talk about their ideas one night every month when there was a full moon.

Watt died a very rich man. We still use his name when we measure energy in watts. And his picture is on the British £50 note.