Preliminary Programme

Wed 30 March
    8.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Thu 31 March
    8.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Fri 1 April
    8.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Sat 2 April
    8.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

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Wednesday 30 March 2016 16.30 - 18.30
H-4 RUR14 Connecting Spaces: Transport, Technical Change, and Social Impacts, 1850-1920
Aula 5, Nivel 0
Networks: Rural , History of Science & Technology Chair: Eduardo Beira
Organizer: Ellan Spero Discussant: Ellan Spero
Marta Felis Rota : A GIS Analysis of the Evolution of the Railway Network and Population Densities in England and Wales, 1851-2000
This paper links the development of urban settlements in England and Wales to the expansion of the railway. We develop what we have called the Historical Geographic Information System - Europe (HGISe). We ensembled a dataset including the population of local civil parishes and operational railway lines and stations with ... (Show more)
This paper links the development of urban settlements in England and Wales to the expansion of the railway. We develop what we have called the Historical Geographic Information System - Europe (HGISe). We ensembled a dataset including the population of local civil parishes and operational railway lines and stations with annual detail from 1851 to 2000 and use GIS software to test whether the uneven geographic transformation of England and Wales is significantly related to access to new means of transportation, namely the newly established railway lines and stations. We find a dynamic relationship between population density growth and transport infrastructure. We suggest the use of railway stations instead of kilometres of line as a more precise indication of access to rail. We find that rural and urban settlements were uneven, and very much linked to the opening of new rail stations. (Show less)

Nancy Koppelman : Hierarchies of Energy on the Streets of New York: Movement by Machine as Social Capital, 1868-1903
Between 1868 and 1903 and with little rule or regulation, New Yorkers came to use varied and incompatible means to get around individually on public streets. Pedestrians, horses, bicycles, and automobiles differed by energy source, expense, speed, convenience, safety, and social meaning. This paper examines mobility on the streets of ... (Show more)
Between 1868 and 1903 and with little rule or regulation, New Yorkers came to use varied and incompatible means to get around individually on public streets. Pedestrians, horses, bicycles, and automobiles differed by energy source, expense, speed, convenience, safety, and social meaning. This paper examines mobility on the streets of New York during this period, and analyzes how the competition to move about freely produced a new form of social capital: individual movement by machine. The study draws on statistical evidence about population and technology, journalistic evidence from the popular press, and secondary historical and sociological sources about the bicycle, the automobile, and urban development.
Until the late 1880s, pedestrians and animals dominated the streets. People moved via raw embodied energy. In 1868 after a French inventor named Lallement introduced a two-wheeled “velocipede” in Boston, news of the device, and soon the device itself, spread quickly to other large eastern cities. Velocipedes were not feasible for sustained outdoor use due to their weight and wheel design, and because streets were unkempt and crowded. Most velocipedists paid to use them in indoor riding “rinks”; few people rode them or even saw them in person.
Yet journalists were fascinated by them. In the aftermath of the Civil War as the very definition of freedom itself was redefined, writers sought to describe freedom and show what it looked like. Throughout 1869, The New York Times, Scientific American, and other popular papers and magazines ran featured articles and regular columns about velocipedes, many with detailed illustrations. Readers witnessed gendered and class-based representations of them, largely without direct reference to race, and constructed a new objective in the collective imagination: individual freedom of movement generated by a machine.
Although the velocipede “craze” lasted only about a year, during the following two decades, mechanics and inventors improved on the velocipede’s alleged “boneshaker” design. By the 1880s, innovations to the “bicycle” dramatically magnified riders’ embodied energy, enabling speed, ease, and individual control that outpaced any other form of movement. Spurred by years of editorial representation, thousands of people riding better-quality devices revised their definition of freedom to include fast individual movement.
From 1893 into the early 1900s the automobile, or “horseless carriage,” inherited the meanings that were inspired decades earlier by the velocipede. Pedestrians, horse-users, bicyclists, and auto drivers attempted to share the streets and held a wide range of mutual prejudices, each arguing for the right to move about at the expense of the others. It was anything but obvious whose needs should take precedence on public roads. Automobile advocates argued that disembodied energy—petroleum, steam, and electricity—implied a form of social capital superior to the embodied energy on which most people still relied. Individual movement generated by disembodied energy thus became a new expression of freedom. The press portrayed the ensuing conflicts as a competition for location on the social hierarchy, based increasingly on revising and redirecting tensions between users of embodied and disembodied energy.
The presentation includes a number of images, as well as a short film clip from the early 20th century showing the intricate interplay of pedestrians, horse users, bicyclists, and auto drivers on a city street.
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Peter Meyer, Intan Hamdan-Livramento & Julio Raffo : Aeronautical Patents and Aviation History from 1880-1916
This paper analyzes how global aeronautics and aircraft patent data reflects technological, industrial, and geopolitical events from 1880 to 1916. Findings are relevant to the interpretation of patent data generally and some fundamental technological and scientific forces leading to new industries remain similar.
We use detailed data on more than ... (Show more)
This paper analyzes how global aeronautics and aircraft patent data reflects technological, industrial, and geopolitical events from 1880 to 1916. Findings are relevant to the interpretation of patent data generally and some fundamental technological and scientific forces leading to new industries remain similar.
We use detailed data on more than 8000 aeronautics and aviation patents granted anywhere in this period. Annual aeronautical patents grew steadily through 1907, rose steeply as an airplane industry emerged, then declined as World War I began.
Basic trends in patent frequency were similar across countries. France, Germany, Britain, and the U.S. had by far the most applications. During World War I patents declined, especially in Germany and France. In the U.S. the first Wright brothers patent blocked others and led to legal battles, lasting effects on the industry, and a patent pool.
The early inventors were inspired by scientific curiosity, user innovation, and hobbyist experimentation. Their patent rights were almost never assigned to firms. Few of the early inventors participated in the new industry. Patent data show the growing role of firms in funding and acquiring aeronautical technologies. We examine whether these inventors patented in other fields before or after patenting in aeronautics.
Trends in patent content were similar across countries, and certain inventions were cited quickly in other countries. We measure a patent’s likelihood of being cited as it aged, including citations after 1916. We show when and how patents on heavier-than-air airplane designs overtook lighter-than-air balloon designs. We expect to compare counts of patents on control systems, scientific instruments, propulsion, and military devices.

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Bruno Navarro, Hugo Silveira Pereira : Building Railways in the Portugese Colonies of Africa and India: the Mormugao and Ambaca Railways
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Robert Schwartz : Railways, Environmental Change, and Public Health in Great Britain, 1850 to 1914
This paper examines the ways in which British railways contributed both to health problems and to their solution. The linking of locomotive smoke with respiratory disease and the resulting policies of smoke abatement form one example. Another was the unexpected increase in infant mortality in the 1890s that was tied ... (Show more)
This paper examines the ways in which British railways contributed both to health problems and to their solution. The linking of locomotive smoke with respiratory disease and the resulting policies of smoke abatement form one example. Another was the unexpected increase in infant mortality in the 1890s that was tied to use of cow’s milk for infant feeding, milk shipped from milk stations to the corner store by rail that was spoiled or adulterated when it reached the unwitting mother and her child. Turning to positive change, railways increased the pace and extent of communication throughout the country. In public health, railway carried legislation, reform schemes, and inspectors to mining and manufacturing sites. More importantly, rail transportation carried medical knowledge and practitioners to sites in their assigned districts, be they urban or rural. Of particular interest in my examination are the Medical Officers of Health, doctors responsible for improving public health in the communities they served. The extent to which rail service facilitated their work within rural districts is a major question to be assessed. (Show less)



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