Charles Husband
Sir Henry Charles Husband (30 October 1908 – 7 October 1983) was a leading British civil and consulting engineer from Sheffield, England, who designed bridges and other major civil engineering works. He is particularly known for his work on the Jodrell Bank radio telescopes; the first of these was the largest fully-steerable radio telescope in the world on its completion in 1957.
Early life and education
Husband was born in Sheffield in 1908 to Ellen Walton, née Harby, and her husband, Joseph (1871–1961), a civil engineer who had founded Sheffield Technical School's civil engineering department and subsequently served as the University of Sheffield's initial professor in the discipline.[1] Charles Husband attended the city's King Edward VII School and gained an engineering degree at Sheffield University in 1929.[1][2]
Career
His first job was with Barnsley Water Board. He then worked under the civil engineer Sir Owen Williams in 1931–33, before spending three years on various major English and Scottish residential projects with the First National Housing Trust.[1] In 1936, with Joseph Husband and Antony Clark, he founded the consulting engineering firm of Husband and Clark (later Husband & Co.) in Sheffield. During the Second World War, he first worked in the Ministry of Labour and National Service and later on aircraft manufacture for the Ministry of Works.[1]
After the war, Husband headed the engineering consultancy, successfully expanding their business, with post-war clients including the British Iron and Steel Research Association, National Coal Board and the Production Engineering Research Association. Outside the UK, the company had an office in Colombo and undertook multiple projects in Sri Lanka.[1]
Radio telescopes
From 1949, Husband worked with Bernard Lovell, the founder of the Jodrell Bank Observatory near Holmes Chapel in Cheshire, on the design and construction of the observatory's first large steerable radio telescope, the "250-ft telescope", now known as the Lovell Telescope.[1][3] The telescope posed such formidable engineering problems that the project had been declared impossible by other engineers.[1][4] Husband is reported to have considered, "It's not impossible, it's difficult, but about the same problem as throwing a swing bridge over the Thames at Westminster."[4] Construction began in 1952 and was completed in 1957, when the Lovell Telescope was the largest fully-steerable radio telescope in the world.[5] Husband also helped to design the steerable radio aerials at the GPO's Goonhilly Satellite Earth Station in Cornwall, as well as radio telescopes in the UK and elsewhere.[1]
Other construction projects
Other innovative projects Husband & Co. undertook under Husband's leadership included designing a facility for testing jet engines at altitude in 1946.[1] The firm also designed the bridge used in the 1957 film, The Bridge on the River Kwai.[6]
Husband was awarded the contract to rebuild the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait in Wales, after a 1970 fire. The original was an 1850 rail bridge by Robert Stephenson, and Husband faced criticism for designing a double-tier bridge including an additional road deck, which he stated formed part of Stephenson's original concept.[1]
Awards and honours
Husband was recognised with the CBE in 1964.[1] He won the Royal Medal of the Royal Society in 1965 for "his distinguished work in many aspects of engineering, particularly for his design studies of large structures such as those exemplified in the radio telescope at Jodrell Bank and Goonhilly Downs"[7] and also won the Wilhelm Exner Medal of the Österreichischer Gewerbeverein in 1966.[8] He served as president of the Institution of Structural Engineers in 1964–65,[9] and was awarded their Gold Medal in 1973.[10] He was knighted in 1975.[1]
Personal life
In 1932, Husband married Eileen Margaret Nowill (born 1906/7), an architect's daughter who was also from Sheffield. The couple had four children, with the elder of his two sons, Richard Husband, also becoming a civil engineer. Husband died in 1983 at Nether Padley, just outside Sheffield in Derbyshire.[1]
See also
- Mott MacDonald, into which Husband & Co. merged in 1990
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Charles Husband : Oxford Biography Index entry (subscription required)". Oxforddnb.com. Retrieved 2010-04-08.
- ^ "The Edwardian 1997". Oldedwardians.org.uk. Retrieved 2010-04-08.
- ^ "The History of Jodrell Bank | Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics". Jodrellbank.manchester.ac.uk. 2008-09-26. Retrieved 2010-04-08.
- ^ a b Jon Excell (1 January 2006). "Pioneer of radar and eminent astronomer Sir Bernard Lovell". The Engineer. Retrieved 15 October 2016.
- ^ Sir Bernard Lovell Telescope, Jodrell Bank Laboratory, Historic England, retrieved 16 October 2016
- ^ Eagan 2009, p. 537
- ^ "The Society's Notes". Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London. 21: 80–85. 1966 – via JSTOR.
{{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter|registration=ignored (|url-access=suggested) (help)}} - ^ "Preisträger". Österreichischer Gewerbeverein. Retrieved 16 October 2016.
- ^ "Past presidents". Institution of Structural Engineers. Retrieved 16 October 2016.
- ^ "IStructE Gold Medallists 1922-2008". Institution of Structural Engineers. Retrieved 3 September 2015.
Source
- Daniel Eagan. America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry (Bloomsbury; 2009) (ISBN 1441116478)