Wright, Arthur

SUBJECT AREA: Electricity, Public utilities

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b. 1858 London, England

d. 26 July 1931 Paignton, Devon, England

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English engineer and electricity supply industry pioneer.

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Arthur Wright, educated at Maryborough College, attended a course of training at the School of Submarine Telegraphy, Telephony and Electric Light in London. In 1882 he joined the Hammond Company in Brighton, the first company to afford a regular electricity supply in Britain on a commercial basis for street and private lighting. He invented a recording ammeter and also a thermal-demand indicator used in conjunction with a tariff based on maximum demand in addition to energy consumption. This indicator was to remain in use for almost half a century.

Resigning his position in Brighton in 1889, he joined the staff of S.Z.de Ferranti and served with him during developments at the Grosvenor Gallery and Deptford stations in London. In 1891 he returned to Brighton as its first Borough Electrical Engineer. From 1900 onwards he had an extensive consulting practice designing early power stations, and was approached by many municipalities and companies in Britain, the United States, South America and Australia, primarily on finance and tariffs. Associated with the founding of the Municipal Electrical Association in 1905, the following year he became its first President.

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Bibliography

1901, British patent no. 23,153 (thermal maximum demand indicator).

1922, "Early days of the Brighton electricity supply", Journal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers 60:497–9.

Further Reading

Obituary, 1931, Journal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers 69:1,327–8.

R.H.Parsons, 1939, Early Days of the Power Station Industry, Cambridge, pp. 13–17 (describes Wright's pioneering inventions).

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