James Watt (1736-1819)
James Watt is one of Scotland’s most famous names. Generally speaking, his contribution to the development of steam power has raised him well above his contemporaries in the public imagination. He is one of the most commemorated individuals from the Georgian era, and his time at the University is testament to the progressive, diverse atmosphere in the city in the eighteenth century.
Watt was born in Greenock, which served as an important port town for Glasgow’s growing commercial activities until the Clyde itself was adequately deepened. From 1756 to 1764 he worked as mathematical instrument maker to the University of Glasgow. From 1759 onwards, Watt had workshops in the Saltmarket and Trongate areas, where he and his partner John Craig manufactured scientific equipment together.
Among Watt’s contemporaries in Glasgow were William Cullen (1710-1790) and Joseph Black (1728-1799), whose studies in chemistry are said to have informed his interest in heat as a source of power. It is also said that John Anderson asked for Watt’s help repairing a model Newcomen steam engine – the same that would be the foundations of his own engine. Together, this network of scientists that surrounded Watt in Glasgow was an important aspect of the city’s relationship with the Enlightenment.
The story goes that it was during a stroll in Glasgow Green when Watt came up with the idea that would revolutionise travel: the separate condenser which would vastly improve the Newcomen steam engine. It is interesting that Watt, as one of Glasgow’s most famous figures, went on to become a symbol of the industrial revolution. Could his monumental fame have overshadowed that of Anderson, Black, and even Adam Smith to the point where it is easier to think of Glasgow as an industrial, Victorian city rather than an enlightened, Georgian one?