Alexander Bain (inventor)
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
Alexander Bain (October 1811 – January 2, 1877), was a clockmaker who invented an electric clock, the electric printing telegraph and a facsimile machine.
Born in Watten, Caithness, Scotland, he was apprenticed to a clockmaker in Wick and moved eventually to Edinburgh and then to London.
His first patent was in January 1841 for the electric clock which contained a pendulum kept in motion by electromagnetic impulses. He went on to design a number of electric clocks and the Earth Battery to supply these with a reasonably stable and constant current of low e.mf.
Bain's ideas on electrical horology were incorparated in five English patents taken out during the period 1841 to 1852, and these also include much of his work on telegraphy.
In 1842, he transmitted the first image over a wire and went on to patent the facsimile machine in May 1843. His fax machine relied also on the movement of a pendulum. To begin with Bain made a considerable sum from his inventions but due to poor investments he was eventually supported only by his Civil List pension of £80 per year.
A pub in Wick, close to where Alexander Bain served his apprenticeship, is now named for the inventor.
