Adolf Friedrich Lindemann

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Water tower in Speyer-West , built in 1883 by Adolf Friedrich Lindemann

Adolf Friedrich Lindemann (born May 13, 1846 in Langenberg ; † August 25, 1931 in Marlow Bucks , United Kingdom ) was a German-British engineer, entrepreneur and amateur astronomer.

Life

Lindemann was trained as an engineer and instrument maker in Nuremberg and built scientific instruments at Ertel & Söhne in Munich . He came to the United Kingdom around 1871 and got a job at the Siemens brothers' cable factory in Woolwich near London. The company manufactured underwater cables. In 1874 he was appointed head of the department that laid the first transatlantic telegraph cable from the United States to Ireland.

Lindemann acquired British citizenship and remained connected to his Palatinate homeland. During an excursion to search for fossils , he came into business contact with the city during a stay in Pirmasens in 1876 and received the concession to build a waterworks on December 12, 1876. The “Pirmasens Water Company” reserved all connections, pipework and repairs for itself and supplied the growing industrial city with water. First, however, various difficulties had to be overcome, which in the Pirmasens vernacular gave rise to a mocking song: “At the well in front of the gate, Lindemann lives there. There are all the pipes that still have no water ”. In fact, the historic water tower at Pirmasens, still preserved today, did not go into operation until 1908. Subsequently, Lindemann created the first modern drinking water network with 20 km of pipes and 105 hydrants on the basis of a stock corporation from 1882 to 1883 in Speyer . Lindemann wanted to win over a large number of communities in the Vorderpfalz for a large hygienic drinking water system, but only found acceptance with his ideas in Speyer, where several cholera epidemics had occurred in the 1870s. The smaller communities shied away from investing.

Lindemann became a successful and rich entrepreneur. He got in touch with the banker Benjamin Davidson about the financing of his projects. After Davidson's death, on May 6, 1884, he married his very wealthy widow Mary or Olga Noble (* 1851, † around 1927), himself heiress to a wealthy family of engineers from New London (Connecticut) . In the same year the family moved from London to Sidholm, Sidmouth , Devon on the British south coast, where his wife owned a country house.

In addition, Lindemann did astronomical observations in his free time from a young age and was involved in the construction of astronomical instruments. In 1872 he applied for membership in the Royal Astronomical Society and was elected a member in 1874. Three of his four advocates were astronomers from the Greenwich Royal Observatory . His excellent and extensive knowledge of astronomy subsequently earned him the respect of many full-time astronomers. In Sidmouth he built a private observatory and a workshop for building astronomical instruments. He developed a new chronograph and revolving eye parts for astronomical telescopes that were used in many observatories around the world.

After the death of his wife, Lindemann donated the observatory to the University of Exeter . The couple had a daughter and three sons, including Frederick Lindemann (1886–1957), who was born in Baden-Baden while his mother was on a spa stay .

Honors

literature

  • Obituary for Adolf Friedrich Lindemann. In: Quarterly journal of the Astronomical Society, volumes 68/69, 1933, pp. Viii ff.
  • Wilhelm Brüggenthies; Wolfgang R. Dick: Biographical Index of Astronomy , Acta Historica Astronomiae, Vol. 26, Verlag Harri Deutsch, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-8171-1769-8 , p. 285
  • Thomas Hockey (Ed.): Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers , Springer 2007, pp. 698f.
  • James Gerald Crowther: Statesmen of Science . Cresset Press, London 1965.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Lindemann, Adolf Friedrich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Lindemann, Adolphus Frederick
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British engineer and amateur astronomer
DATE OF BIRTH May 13, 1846
PLACE OF BIRTH Langenberg
DATE OF DEATH August 25, 1931
Place of death Marlow Bucks , United Kingdom