Charles Fairburn | |
---|---|
Born |
Bradford, Yorkshire, England |
5 September 1887
Died | 12 October 1945 | (aged 58)
Nationality | British |
Education | Brasenose College, Oxford |
Engineering career | |
Discipline | Electrical |
Charles Edward Fairburn (5 September 1887 – 12 October 1945) was an electrical engineer whose work mainly concerned rail transport.
Born in Bradford in 1887, and educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, his career included railway electrification work undertaken in the 1910s at the Siemens Brothers Dynamo Works Ltd., then similar work at English Electric in the 1920s where he also was involved in electric traction development work. In 1934 he joined the London, Midland and Scottish Railway where he was responsible for the introduction of new classes of diesel-electric shunting locomotives - he became Chief Mechanical Engineer of the company in the 1940s, but died in 1945 aged 58.
Charles Edward Fairburn was born on 5 September 1887 in Bradford. After an education at Bradford Grammar School he won a scholarship to Brasenose College, Oxford University where he studied mathematics and engineering, and obtained a first class degree. After college he served two years under the tutelage of Henry Fowler at the Derby Works of the Midland Railway. He studied technical drawing at Derby, and metallurgy at Sheffield, obtaining a MA in 1912.
Fairburn's career then began in 1912 at the Siemens Brothers dynamo works (Siemens Brothers Dynamo Works Ltd.) in Stafford, where he worked in the railway engineering department; he was an assistant engineer on the Shildon-Newport electrification of the North Eastern Railway (see Railway electrification in Great Britain), being responsible for the design of overhead line electrification equipment and introduction of electric locomotives.