John Philip Holland
John Philip Holland ( ) (29 February, 1840 – 2
August, 1914) was an
engineer who developed
the first
submarine to be formally
commissioned by the
U.S. Navy (though not the first American
submarine, see
American Civil
War submarines, and the earlier
Nautilus and
Turtle) and the first ever
Royal Navy submarine, the
Holland 1.
History
Early life
He was one
of four brothers who may have been born in Liscannor
, County
Clare
, Ireland
to an
Irish speaking mother, Máire Ní
Scannláin, and John Holland, and learned English properly only when
he attended the local English-speaking National School system and, from
1858, in the Christian Brothers in
Ennistymon
.Holland joined the Irish Christian Brothers in
Limerick
and taught
in Limerick and many other centres in the country. Due to
ill health, he left the Christian Brothers in 1873.
He and his brother, Mícheál, were both active in the
Irish Republican Brotherhood
(IRB), the precursor to the
Irish
Republican Army. Mícheál introduced the inventor to the
revolutionary group. Holland and the
Fenians
conceived a plan to develop a small submarine that could be
sealifted on a large merchant ship to an area near an unsuspecting
British
warship. The submarine would then be
released from the bottom of the merchant vessel and attack the
warship.
Development of submarine designs
Holland
emigrated to the United
States
in 1873. Initially working for an
engineering firm, he returned to teaching again for a further six
years in St. John’s Catholic School in Paterson, New Jersey. In
1875, his first submarine designs were submitted for consideration
by the
U.S. Navy, but turned down as unworkable. The
Fenians, however, continued to fund Holland's research and
development expenses at a level that allowed him to resign from his
teaching post. In 1881,
Fenian
Ram was launched, but soon after, Holland and the Fenians
parted company angrily, primarily due to issues of payment within
the Fenian organization, and between the Fenians and Holland. The
submarine is now preserved at
Paterson
Museum, New Jersey.
Holland continued to improve his designs and worked on several
experimental boats, prior to his successful efforts with a
privately built type, launched on 17 May, 1897. This was the first
submarine having power to run submerged for any considerable
distance, and the first to combine electric motors for submerged
travel and gasoline engines for use on the surface. She was
purchased by the
U.S. Navy (on 11 April, 1900) after rigorous
tests and was commissioned on 12 October, 1900 as
USS Holland. Six more of her
type were ordered and built under the supervision of
Arthur Leopold Busch, the head of
construction at the
Crescent
Shipyard in Elizabeth, New Jersey and the same shipyard (and
man) where the USS Holland (SS-1) was developed. The company that
emerged from under these developments was called
The Electric Boat Company,
founded on 7 February, 1899.
Isaac
Leopold Rice became the company's first President with
Elihu B. Frost
acting as vice president and
chief financial officer.
The
USS Holland design was also adopted by others,
including the
Royal Navy in developing
the
Holland class submarine.
The
Imperial Japanese Navy
employed a modified version of the basic design for their first
five submarines, although these submarines were at least 10 feet
longer at about 63 feet. These Imperial Japanese Naval Submarines
were also developed by Holland's confidant, Arthur L.
Busch at the Fore River Ship
and Engine Company
in Quincy, MA.
John Philip Holland also designed the
Holland II and
Holland III prototypes.
After
spending 57 of his 74 years working with submersibles, John Philip
Holland died in August of 1914 in Newark, New Jersey
.
Holland is
interred at the Holy Sepulchre Cemetery in Totowa, New
Jersey
.
A dramatization of Holland's life was written by playwright
Aidan Harney
Patents
- Screw Propeller
- Hydrocarbon Engine
- Submergible
- Submarine Gun
- Steering Apparatus
- Submarine Boat
- Submerigible Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Visual Indicator
- Auto Dive Mechanism
- Auto Ballast
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Firing Valve
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Gun
- Submarine Boat
- Submarine Boat
References
- John Philip Holland article, Encyclopaedia
Britannica
- Source: Lecture by Pat Sweeney, Maritime Institute of Ireland
16 January 2009: His father was a member of the Coastguard and occupied a
coastguard cottage. There were no coastguard cottages or station in
Liscannor.
-
http://www.northstar.k12.ak.us/schools/ryn/projects/inventors/holland/holland.html;
http://www.irishclans.com/articles/famirish/hollandjp.html;
http://www.oocities.com/gwmccue/People/Holland_John.html Holland's
background and childhood in Clare and Limerick
- The Phoenix, Clare Champion, Friday August 9,
1996
- Davies, R. Nautilus: The Story of Man Under the Sea.
Naval Institute Press. 1995.
ISBN 1-55750-615-9.
- http://www.upstate.ie/live/index.html
- John Philip Holland, Encyclopedia of World
Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998.
- Who Built Those Subs? Naval History
Magazine, Oct. 1998 125th Anniversary issue, pp.31-34.
Richard Knowles Morris PhD. Published by the USNI Annapolis,
MD.
- International Directory of Company Histories,
Volume 86 under General Dynamics/Electric Boat Corporation, July,
2007. Pages 136-139. Published by St. James Press/Thomposon Gale
Group.
- The Defender, The Story of General Dynamics,
by Roger Franklin. Published by Harper & Row 1986.
- The Submarine in War and Peace by Simon Lake,
published in 1918 by J. P. Lippincott, Philadelphia, PA. See pages
113-118.
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