Maxim
Maxim names 2 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Maxim SIR HIRAM STEVENS, an American inventor
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
SIR HIRAM STEVENS, an American inventor; born in Sanger- Language" (1910), and other works. ville, Me., Feb. 5, 1840; received a common school education; secured his scientific knowledge by reading and attending lectures; was employed in various iron works; and removed to England in 1881. He patented numerous inventions, includ ing incandescent lamps, self-regulating current machines, the "Cordite" smoke less powder, etc.; devoted much attention to the problem of aërial navigation; but was best known as the inventor of the Maxim gun. He was manager of the firm of Vickers, Sons & Maxim, and a member of numerous American and European scientific and engineering societies. Early in 1901 he was knighted by Queen Victoria. He became a citizen of Great Britain, alleging unfair treatment of his inventions in the United States. His autobiography was published in 1915, He died in 1916.
Maxim HUDSON, inventor and engineer
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
HUDSON, inventor and engineer. Born at Orneville, Me., in 1853, was educated at the Maine Wesleyan Seminary, later entering the printing and subscription business at Pittsfield, Mass. He took up the business of ordnance and explosives in 1888 and was the first to manufacture smokeless powder in the United States, submitting HUDSON MAXIM samples to the government. Built dynamite factory and smokeless powder mill and sold his inventions to the E. I. du Pont de Nemours Co., becoming consult. ing engineer to the company. His other inventions include motorite, for driving torpedoes, stabilite, a smokeless powder and torpedo ram. He is author of "The Science of Poetry and Philosophy of MAXIM GUN. See MACHINE GUN.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's wrote of Hudson Maxim in 1921 as a living consulting engineer to du Pont; he died at Landing, New Jersey, in 1927, and his once-famous verse treatise "The Science of Poetry" is now a curiosity rather than a standard work. Sir Hiram's reputation has narrowed to the one thing Collier's already named as his best-known work: the Maxim gun, whose descendants — the British Vickers and the German MG 08 — did much of the killing on the Western Front, so that he is now remembered chiefly as the man who mechanised infantry slaughter. His claim to "Cordite" was in fact contested in the English courts, where Abel and Dewar's patent was upheld against him, and his 1894 steam-powered flying machine, which lifted briefly from its rails at Baldwyns Park, is treated today as a dead end rather than a step toward flight. The family line continued: Hiram's son Hiram Percy Maxim invented the firearm silencer and co-founded the American Radio Relay League.
Written for this edition, 2026.