John Ambrose Fleming
Sir John Ambrose Fleming FRS[1] (29 November 1849 – 18 April 1945) was an English electrical engineer and physicist who invented the first thermionic valve or vacuum tube,[2] designed the radio transmitter with which the first transatlantic radio transmission was made, and also established the right-hand rule used in physics.[3]
For other people named John Fleming, see John Fleming (disambiguation).
Sir John Ambrose Fleming
18 April 1945 (aged 95)
Hughes Medal (1910)
Albert Medal (1921)
Faraday Medal (1928)
Duddell Medal (1930)
IRE Medal of Honor (1933)
Franklin Medal (1935)
Fellow of the Royal Society[1]
He was the eldest of seven children of James Fleming DD (died 1879), a Congregational minister, and his wife Mary Ann, at Lancaster, Lancashire, and baptised on 11 February 1850.[4] A devout Christian, he once preached at St Martin-in-the-Fields in London on evidence for the resurrection.
In 1932, he and Douglas Dewar and Bernard Acworth helped establish the Evolution Protest Movement. Fleming bequeathed much of his estate to Christian charities, especially those for the poor. He was a noted photographer, painted watercolours, and enjoyed climbing the Alps.
Early years[edit]
Ambrose Fleming was born in Lancaster and educated at Lancaster Royal Grammar School, University College School, London, and then University College London, where he obtained a BSc in 1870. He entered St John's College, Cambridge in 1877, gaining a DSc from the University of London in 1879 and a BA from Cambridge in 1881, before becoming a fellow of St John's in 1883.[5] He went on to lecture at several universities including the University of Cambridge, University College Nottingham, and University College London, where he was the first professor of electrical engineering. He was also a consultant to the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company, Swan Company, Ferranti, Edison Telephone, and later the Edison Electric Light Company. In 1892, Fleming presented an important paper on electrical transformer theory to the Institution of Electrical Engineers in London.
Creationism[edit]
Fleming was a Christian creationist who argued against evolution.[17] He was President of the Victoria Institute from 1927 to 1942.[1]
Lectures[edit]
In 1894 and 1917 Ambrose Fleming was invited to deliver the Royal Institution Christmas Lecture on The Work of an Electric Current and Our Useful Servants : Magnetism and Electricity respectively.
Collections[edit]
In 1945 Fleming's widow donated Fleming's library and papers to University College London. Fleming's library, which totals around 950 items, includes first editions of works by prominent scientists and engineers such as James Clerk Maxwell, Oliver Lodge, James Dewar and Shelford Bidwell.[18] Fleming's archive spans 521 volumes and 12 boxes; it contains his laboratory notebooks, lecture notes, patent specifications, and correspondence.[19]
