Andrew Betts Brown

Andrew Betts Brown MICE MINA (1841–1906) was a Scottish engineer and inventor. He invented the hydraulic crane and overhead travelling crane. He founded several companies including the Vauxhall Iron Works, which later evolved into Vauxhall Motors, and the huge British engineering firm Brown Brothers.

Life

He was born on 4 May 1841 in Edinburgh the eldest son of Robert Brown, a bricklayer living at 86 Canongate, and his wife, Marion Betts. He was educated at the High School in Edinburgh. From around 1855 he was apprenticed as an engineer with the North British Railway based at St Margaret’s Yard in Edinburgh. He took evening classes at the Watt College (later Heriot Watt) winning prizes in Natural Philosophy (Physics) and Dynamics. He then went to Manchester for two years to study Sciences and began specialising in hydraulics.

He is first listed as an "engineer" living back with his parents in Edinburgh in 1861. In 1862, living in Stockport, he took out a patent for the improvement of steam engines and boilers. In 1863 he purchased a former brewery in Vauxhall in London and created the Vauxhall Iron Works. In 1863 he invented an overhead travelling crane, which was successfully used to construct Blackfriars Bridge over the River Thames in central London.

In 1884 he went into partnership with William F. King to create King, Brown & Co, electrical engineers based at the Rosebank Works in Leith. The Rosebank Works had been established by David George Brown (his brother) in 1872. The company was renamed Brown Brothers around 1900 and specialised in major ship components.

He died at home, 19 Douglas Crescent, in Edinburgh’s West End on 13 May 1906. He is buried with his wife in the north-west section of the Victorian extension to Dean Cemetery. The inscription on the stone, "no more pain", implies a prolonged illness before death.

Brown Brothers continued after his death, doing important engineering works, including building the world's first tanks for World War One.

Family

In 1869 he married Anna Maria Pilliner of Jamaica (1848–1906), at Toxteth Park. They had four children.

Publications Engineering Facts and Figures (1865)