T. T. Vernon Smith

Thomas Timmis Vernon Smith (1824–1890) was a civil engineer who worked on several railways throughout England, Europe and Russia before immigrating to Canada and becoming Chief Engineer on the Windsor and Annapolis Railway project in 1866. The railway opened up accessibility to the Annapolis Valley, and was vital to the establishment of its agricultural industry by enabling the transport of fruit and livestock to global markets. Vernon Smith holds the 1859 patent for the first automated steam-powered foghorn, which known as the Vernon-Smith horn.

Vernon Smith from one of the oldest families in England connected to the iron and steel trades. Seven generations previously in 1612, as cutlers, the family was named in a Royal Charter granted by King James The First. Vernon Smith’s mother was a great-grandniece of Admiral Edward Vernon, after whom George Washington’s Virginia estate, Mount Vernon, was named. Vernon Smith’s brother founded the UK Iron and Steel Institute. With his father, young Vernon attended the launch of England’s pioneer railway in 1830, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, and he later apprenticed with the makers of its locomotives, George and Robert Stephenson, his father’s friends. In 1875, Vernon Smith married Ella Maude Ross from New Ross, Nova Scotia, with whom he had four surviving children. He later lived and consulted from Ottawa. He died of “La Grippe” on January 15, 1890 while completing work in New Brunswick. Vernon Smith is the great-grandfather of Allen C Eaves, a Canadian scientist and entrepreneur.

Vernon Smith built railways in Spain, France and Russia before moving to Upper Canada to become Head Engineer of the Woodstock Iron Works in New Brunswick in 1852. In 1855 he superintended the construction of the Cobourg and Peterborough Railroad before being promoted to Provincial Engineer by the New Brunswick Board of Trade. During this time he patented the first automated steam-powered foghorn, which has since been adopted in Canada as well as on the English Coasts and elsewhere. The foghorn was constructed at Partridge Island in 1859 as the Vernon-Smith horn, but invention of the horn was later attributed to Robert Foulis.

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