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{{Short description|American civil engineer (1800–1849)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = George Washington Whistler
| image = 'Major George Washington Whistler' by Henry Inman, Cincinnati Art Museum.png
| caption = Portrait of Major George Washington Whistler by [[Henry Inman (painter)|Henry Inman]]
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1800|05|19}}
| birth_place = [[Fort Wayne, Indiana]], US
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1849|04|07|1800|05|19}}
| death_place = [[St. Petersburg, Russia|St. Petersburg]], [[Russian Empire|Russia]]
| burial_place = [[Stonington, Connecticut]], US<ref name="ascebio"/>
| alma_mater = [[United States Military Academy]]
| occupation = Civil engineer
| parents = [[John Whistler]] and Anna Bishop
| spouse = {{plainlist|
*{{marriage|Mary Roberdeau Swift|1821|1827|end=d}}
*{{marriage|[[Anna McNeill Whistler|Anna Mathilda McNeill]]|1831}}
}}
| children = 8; including [[James McNeill Whistler]]
}}
'''George Washington Whistler''' (May 19, 1800 – April 7, 1849) was an American [[civil engineer]] best known for building [[steam locomotive]]s and railroads.<ref name="Homer B. Vanderblue 1939 pp 6-11">{{cite journal |doi=10.1017/S0007680500022066 |title=An Engineer Writes on Railroad Construction Standards in 1842 |journal=Business History Review |volume=13 |pages=6–11 |year=1939 |last1=Vanderblue |first1=Homer B.|s2cid=154969863 }}</ref> He is credited with introducing the [[steam whistle]] to American locomotives.<ref name="smith">{{cite news|last1=MacGregor|first1=Jeff|title=Getting to Know Whistler's Father|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/getting-know-whistlers-father-180951439/|accessdate=27 January 2018|work=[[Smithsonian (magazine)|Smithsonian]]|date=June 2014}}</ref>
In 1842, Tsar [[Nicholas I of Russia|Nicholas I]] hired him to build the [[Saint Petersburg–Moscow Railway]], Russia's first large-scale railroad.<ref name="ASCE 2015">Gasparini, D. A., K. Nizamiev, and C. Tardini. "GW Whistler and the Howe Bridges on the Nikolaev Railway, 1842–1851", American Society of Civil Engineers, ''Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities'' 30.3 (2015): DOI link:04015046.https://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CF.1943-5509.0000791</ref> One of Whistler's important influences was the introduction of the Howe truss for the Russian railroad's bridges. This inspired the renowned Russian engineer [[Dmitrii Ivanovich Zhuravskii]] to perform studies and develop structural analysis techniques for [[Howe truss]] bridges.
He was the father of American artist [[James McNeill Whistler]], whose painting ''[[Whistler's Mother]]'' (of his second wife Anna Whistler) is among the most famous paintings in American art.<ref name="smith"/>
==Early life and family==
George Washington Whistler was born on May 19, 1800, at the military outpost of [[Forts of Fort Wayne, Indiana|Fort Wayne]], Indiana, to Major [[John Whistler]] (1756–1829) and his wife Anna Bishop.<ref name="Homer B. Vanderblue 1939 pp 6-11"/> Ft. Wayne at that time was a part of the great [[Northwest Territory]]. His father had been a British soldier under General [[John Burgoyne|Burgoyne]] at the [[Battles of Saratoga]] in the Revolutionary War, later to enlist in American service.
Whistler had three children with his first wife, Mary Roberdeau Swift, who died at a young age in 1827.<ref name="Biographical sketch">, Anon., George Washington Whistler (1800–1849), University of Glasgow, accessed at [http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/people/biog/?bid=Whis_Gwa&firstname=George%20Washington&surname=Whistler Biographical sketch] of G. W. Whistler at the Center for Whistler Studies at the University of Glasgow, Scotland on June 20, 2016.</ref> Whistler then married the sister of his friend [[William Gibbs McNeill]] (1801–1853),<ref>{{cite book|last=Hanson|first=Robert Brand |title=Dedham, Massachusetts, 1635-1890|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4oslAQAAMAAJ|year=1976|publisher=Dedham Historical Society|page=227}}</ref><ref name="ascebio">{{cite web|title=George Washington Whistler|url=https://www.asce.org/templates/person-bio-detail.aspx?id=11231|website=American Society of Civil Engineers|accessdate=27 January 2018|archive-date=13 May 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190513135810/https://www.asce.org/templates/person-bio-detail.aspx?id=11231|url-status=dead}}</ref> [[Anna McNeill Whistler|Anna Mathilda McNeill]] (1804–1881), with whom he had five sons: [[James Abbott McNeill Whistler]], [[William McNeill Whistler]] (1836–1900), Kirk Boott (1838–1842) named after [[Kirk Boott]], Charles Donald Whistler (1841–1843), and John Bouttatz Whistler (1845–1846), named after Whistler's Russian engineer friend Major Ivan F. Bouttatz.<ref name="Biographical sketch"/><ref name="whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk">{{cite web|url=http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/biog/display/?bid=Bout_Col |title=The Correspondence of James McNeill Whistler :: The Correspondence |publisher=whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk|accessdate=August 2, 2016}}</ref> Whistler and William Gibbs McNeil lived in [[Fisher Ames]]' house while working on the Boston and Providence Railroad.{{sfn|Hanson|1976|p=227}}
==Education and career==
Whistler graduated from the [[United States Military Academy]] in 1819.<ref name="smith"/><ref>Anon., Smithsonian Museum of American History, accessed at [http://americanhistory.si.edu/westpoint/history_2b1.html#] on June 20, 2016</ref> Upon graduation, Whistler was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the Corps of Artillery serving as a [[topography]] engineer at [[Fort Columbus]], New York, from 1819 to 1821.<ref name="Thayer">[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/America/United_States/Army/USMA/Cullums_Register/214*.html "Register of Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy, Class of 1819"], Cullum's Register, created by W. Thayer.</ref> When the Army was reorganized in 1821, he became a Second Lieutenant in the First Artillery. From 1821 to 1822, Whistler was an Assistant Professor of Drawing at West Point.<ref name="Thayer"/>
Whistler was reassigned back to artillery corps duty as a topographical engineer in 1822, his first assignment was supporting the Commission tracing the international boundary between [[Lake Superior]] and [[Lake of the Woods]]. Subsequent to the passage of the [[General Survey Act]] of 1824, Whistler later conducted surveys for locating railroads working under [[John James Abert]], the head of the [[Corps of Topographical Engineers|Topographic Bureau]].<ref name="Thayer"/>
===Baltimore and Ohio railroad===
In 1827, Whistler's brother-in-law and fellow engineer [[William Gibbs McNeill]] became a member of the [[Baltimore and Ohio Railroad|Baltimore and Ohio railroad]]'s "Board of Civil Engineers for the Construction of the Road" (1827‑30).<ref name="McNeill">[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/America/United_States/Army/USMA/Cullums_Register/172*.html "Register of Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy, Class of 1819"], Cullum's Register, created by W. Thayer.</ref> Still on active duty, Whistler joined the railroad's engineer corps the next year in 1828. Together, Whistler, McNeill, and [[Jonathan Knight (railroader)|Jonathan Knight]] went to Great Britain to study railroad engineering, where they were welcomed by President [[Thomas Telford#Late career|Telford]], of the British [[Institution of Civil Engineers]], where they also met with [[George Stephenson]] and son [[Robert Stephenson]], [[James Walker (engineer)|John Walker]], [[Joseph Locke]], [[Jesse Hartley]], and other eminent British engineers.<ref name="McNeill"/> They also saw the British railroad, the [[Stockton and Darlington]],<ref name="Stapleton">Stapleton, Darwin H. "The Origin of American Railroad Technology, 1825–1840", ''Railroad History'' 139 (1978): 65–77. Web.</ref> the world's first public railway to use [[steam locomotive]]s. As one observer wrote:
{{blockquote|Apparently there was nothing to keep American engineers with adequate credentials from seeing all they wanted to see and from asking about all that they wanted to learn. As a result the American engineers developed knowledge of railroads in three areas –
(1) [[Steam locomotive|(Steam) locomotives]] and [[inclined plane]]s, the two "new" elements in railroads,
<br>(2) the uses of materials- especially stone, wood and iron- in construction, and
<br>(3) the principles of laying out routes feasible for railroad travel.<ref name="Stapleton" />}}
Whistler supervised construction of the first rails on the railroad in October 1829, consisting of wood and iron from Pratt Street to the [[Carrollton Viaduct]]. The railroad's future road master, [[Wendel Bollman]], helped with the construction layout as a fifteen-year-old carpenter.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Great Road: The Building of the Baltimore and Ohio, the Nation's First Railroad|author=James D. Dilts|page=128}}</ref>
===Other railroads===
In 1830, McNeill and Whistler entered the service of the [[Northern Central Railway#Early history|Baltimore and Susquehanna railroad]], Whistler remaining on the project for the first 20 miles of main and branch track had been completed.<ref name="Thayer"/> In 1831‑32, Whistler provided engineering services for the [[Paterson and Hudson River Railroad|Paterson and Hudson River railroad]] (now southern terminus of Erie) Railroad; and in 1833‑34, upon the [[New York, Providence and Boston Railroad|Providence and Stonington Railroad]].<ref name="Thayer"/>
Whistler resigned his army engineer commission in December 1833.<ref name="Thayer"/> In 1835, along with [[William Gibbs McNeill]], Whistler designed the [[Boston & Providence Railroad]], which included the famous [[Canton Viaduct]] which has been in continuous service for 174 years.
===Locomotive designer and builder===
In 1834, Whistler became chief engineer at the [[Proprietors of Locks and Canals]] in the new city of [[Lowell, Massachusetts]].<ref name="Thayer"/> Whistler was one of the few locomotive designers and builders in the early 19th century that had an academic education. As superintendent of the Proprietors of Locks and Canals Co. water powered machine shop in Lowell (1834–1837), Whistler was responsible for the design of the earliest [[steam locomotive]] built in New England.<ref>{{White - History of the American locomotive}}, pages 457</ref> In 1835, he worked with [[Patrick Tracy Jackson]] to begin the [[Boston & Lowell Railroad]].<ref>{{cite web | title = Lowell Notes: Patrick Tracy Jackson | publisher = Lowell National Historical Park | url = http://www.nps.gov/lowe/historyculture/upload/Patrick%20Jackson_%20Lowell%20Notes.pdf | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100302195644/http://www.nps.gov/lowe/historyculture/upload/Patrick%20Jackson_%20Lowell%20Notes.pdf | url-status = dead | archive-date = March 2, 2010 | accessdate = May 30, 2009}}</ref>
Whistler's first locomotive, the Patrick, was produced for the [[Boston & Lowell Railroad]]. This locomotive and others built by the firm were initially copies of [[2-2-0|Stephenson Planet]] types (2-2-0s).<ref name="jstor.org">Anon., [https://www.jstor.org/stable/43524479 "Histories of the Individual Firms"], (2007). ''Railroad History'', (197), page 56, 24–85.</ref> In 1836, the first two steam locomotives known to have been equipped with whistles were built by Whistler as 2-2-0 types; the Hicksville for the [[History of the Long Island Rail Road|Long Island Railroad]] and the Susquehanna for the [[Wilmington and Susquehanna Railroad|Wilmington & Susquehanna Railroad]].<ref>Baer, Christopher T. [http://www.prrths.com/newprr_files/Hagley/PRR1867.pdf "A General Chronology of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company Predecessors and Successors and its Historical Context"], 1835–1836, June 2015 Edition.</ref> In 1838, [[Baltimore and Ohio Railroad|Baltimore and Ohio railroad]] engineers [[Jonathan Knight (railroader)|Knight]] and [[Benjamin Henry Latrobe, II|Latrobe]] surveyed steam locomotives for their management, some of which included machines built in Whistler's Lowell shops.<ref name="Knight1838">Knight, Jonathan. ''Report Upon the Locomotive Engines: And the Police and Management of Several of the Principal Rail Roads in the Northern and Middle States'', Being a Sequel to the Report... Upon Railway Structures. Lucas & Deaver., 1838.</ref>
{{Blockquote|text=The (Long Island railroad) engine burns one cord of wood in each circular trip of 48 miles, conveying an average load of twenty tons of freight, in four cars, each weighing two tons – the weight of engine being 8.5 tons, with its fuel and water in the boiler, and having six tons on the two driving wheels; the tender weighs 4.5 tons with fuel and water, the additional quantity of wood consumed in getting up steam, being about one-fifth of a cord.|author=Knight, Latrobe|source=<ref name="Knight1838"/> }}
Whistler built three machines for the [[Boston and Providence Rail Road]], they were almost 9 tons in gross weight and 6 tons in weight on the five foot driving wheels,<ref name="Knight1838"/> a [[2-4-0]] configuration. These machines had [[Steam locomotive#Cylinders|11 inch cylinders]] with a [[Steam locomotive#Steam circuit|16 inch stroke]].<ref name="Knight1838"/> Whistler also built one locomotive for the [[Paterson and Hudson River Railroad|New Jersey and Patterson Rail Road]] weighing 8 tons gross.<ref name="Knight1838"/> Whistler left Lowell in 1837 and was followed by his apprentice, [[James B Francis]].<ref>{{cite web | title = Lowell Notes: James B Francis | publisher = Lowell National Historical Park | url = http://www.nps.gov/lowe/historyculture/upload/JB%20Francis_%20Lowell%20Notes.pdf | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090824165336/http://www.nps.gov/lowe/historyculture/upload/JB%20Francis_%20Lowell%20Notes.pdf | url-status = dead | archive-date = August 24, 2009 | accessdate = May 30, 2009}}</ref> The Lowell Machine Shop's locomotive production continued until 1854.<ref name="jstor.org"/>
===Western railroad (Massachusetts)===
[[File:1837 Western Railroad map, Springfield to State Line.jpg|thumb|1837 Western Railroad map, Springfield to State Line]] Soon after Whistler's work on the [[New York, Providence and Boston Railroad|Stonington Railroad]] he was engaged to consult on the [[Western Railroad (Massachusetts)|Western railroad]] again with McNeill from 1836 to 1842.<ref name ="Vose">Vose, George Leonard. ''A Sketch of the Life and Works of George W. Whistler: Civil Engineer''. Boston: Lee and Shepard; New York: CT Dillingham, 1887.</ref> In October 1839, the road's Board of Directors hired Whistler as its Chief engineer.<ref>Smith, Merritt Roe. Military enterprise and technological change: Perspectives on the American experience. MIT Press, 1985. Accessed at [https://books.google.com/books?id=ukk6jtvWtMoC&q=Whistler&pg=PA108]</ref>
The main problem in locating the railroad were the steep grades west of the [[Westfield River]], a major tributary of the [[Connecticut River]], which were in excess of 80 feet to the mile, (actually 1.65%. west of [[Chester, Massachusetts]]). At that time in 1842, there was no known locomotive that could deliver the [[tractive effort]] to climb that grade. The first locomotives purchased for the road in 1842 were [[Ross Winans|Ross Winan's]] "crabs" or [[0-8-0#United States of America|0-8-0s]] which could not handle the grade. Whistler substituted [[2-2-0|Stephenson Planet]] types (2-2-0s) which delivered satisfactory service.<ref name ="Vose"/>
===Saint Petersburg–Moscow Railway===
[[File:Russian Canton Viaduct.jpg|thumb|right|200px|A bridge model of similar design to the Canton Viaduct at the October Railroad Museum in St. Petersburg]]
[[File:Mstinsky bridge.jpg|thumb|right|400px|[[Msta River]] Howe truss railroad bridge]]
Tsar [[Nicholas I of Russia|Nicholas I]] invited Whistler to help build the [[Saint Petersburg–Moscow Railway]], which would be [[Russia]]'s first major railroad.
Although the [[Tsarskoye Selo Railway]], built by Germany's Franz Anton Ritter von Gerstner in 1837, was Russia's first public railway line, the cost overruns led Tsar Nicholas I and his advisors to doubt Gerstner's ability to execute the planned St. Petersburg–Moscow line.<ref name="ASCE 2015"/> So two professors from St. Petersburg's Institute of the Corps of Transportation Engineers, [[Pavel Petrovich Melnikov]] and Nikolai Osipovich Kraft, traveled to the United States in 1839 to study railroad technology.<ref>Decker, John C., [http://rlhs.org/Reference/history.shtml "Early American Railroad History: A New Source Within Grasp"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200804035211/http://rlhs.org/Reference/history.shtml|date=2020-08-04}}, and [http://rlhs.org/Reference/russia.shtml] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200804034532/http://rlhs.org/Reference/russia.shtml|date=2020-08-04}} on July 24, 2016.</ref> Melnikov and Kraft spoke with Whistler and recommended that the Russian government retain Whistler as a consulting engineer on the Saint Petersburg – Moscow Railway, and Whistler was given a seven-year contract.<ref name="ASCE 2015"/>
Whistler left for Russia in June 1842, accompanied by imperial engineer Major Ivan F. Bouttatz, who would become Whistler's friend.<ref name="ASCE 2015"/><ref name="whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk"/> He received the [[Order of Saint Anna]] by the Russian Emperor in 1847 but contracted [[cholera]] and died on April 7, 1849, in [[Saint Petersburg]], Russia, two years before the line was completed.
==Professional associations==
Whistler was part of the first efforts to form a national engineering association in the United States, although unsuccessful, it was thirteen years ahead of the [[American Society of Civil Engineers|American Society of Civil Engineers and Architects]], which was co-founded in 1852 by his nephew [[Julius Walker Adams]]. There was an organizational meeting in [[Baltimore]], Maryland, in 1839 that elected [[Benjamin Henry Latrobe, II|Benjamin Latrobe]] as its president. The organizing committee included some of the most prominent and representative engineers of the day such as: [[John B. Jervis|J. B. Jervis]] and [[Benjamin Wright (civil engineer)|Benjamin Wright]] of New York, [[Moncure Robinson]] and [[Claude Crozet]] of Virginia, [[Jonathan Knight (railroader)|Jonathan Knight]] of Maryland, [[J. Edgar Thomson]] then in Georgia, later in Pennsylvania.<ref>Merritt, Raymond H. ''Engineering in American Society: 1850–1875'', page 99, University Press of Kentucky, 2015.</ref>
==Legacy==
Whistler's stone arch railroad bridges built in 1841 are still in freight and passenger service on the [[CSX]] mainline in western Massachusetts. He was the first civil engineer in America to use contour lines to show elevation and relief on maps.{{citation needed|date=January 2018}}
==Works==
*Whistler, G. W., Faden, W., & United States. (1838). The British colonies in North America. (Message from the President of the United States, transmitting the information required by a resolution of the House of Representatives of the 28th May last, in relation to the boundary between the United States and Great Britain.)
*Swift, McNeill and Whistler, G.E., Reports of the Engineers of the Western Railroad Corporation,1838, Springfield, MA, Merriam, Wood and company. {{PDFWayback|url=https://archive.org/details/reportsengineer02corpgoog}}
*Western Rail-Road Corporation., Whistler, G. W., & Massachusetts. (1839). Extracts from the 39th chapter of the revised statutes, concerning rail roads. Springfield, Mass.: publisher not identified.
*Albany and West Stockbridge Railroad Company. (1842). Reports of the engineers of the Albany and West Stockbridge Rail-road Company: Made to the directors in 1840–1. Albany N.Y.: Printed by C. Van Benthuysen.
*Whistler, G. W., Crerar Manuscript Collection (University of Chicago. Library), & University of Chicago. (1842). Report to Count Kleinmichel on gauge of track to be used in the St. Petersburg and Moscow Railroad.
*Whistler, G. W., & Philadelphia & Reading Railroad Co. (1849). Report upon the use of anthracite coal in locomotive engines on the Reading Rail Road: Made to the president of the Philadelphia and Reading Rail Road Company. Baltimore: J.D. Toy. {{Google books|0iExAQAAMAAJ|Report|page=|keywords=|text=|plainurl=}}
==See also==
* [[Walk-in-the-Water (steamboat)|''Walk-in-the-Water'' (steamboat)]], illustrations of this vessel by Whistler.
==References==
{{reflist|colwidth=30em}}
==Further reading==
*{{Cite journal |last=Brown |first=Jeff L. |title=Rock Solid: Stone Arch Bridges of the 1840s |journal=Civil Engineering |pages=44–47 |date=January 2014 |issn=0885-7024}}
*{{Cite journal |last=Fisher |first=Chas. E. |title=Whistler's Railroad: The Western Railroad of Massachusetts |journal=[[Railway and Locomotive Historical Society Bulletin]] |volume=69 |issue=69 |date=May 1947 |pages=1–2, 8–100 |jstor=43504556}}
==External links==
*[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/America/United_States/Army/USMA/Cullums_Register/214*.html Extensive biographical sketch of G. W. Washington's career] based upon [[United States Military Academy#Cullum number|George W. Cullum's Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates of the United States Military Academy]] at West Point, New York, since its establishment in 1802.
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=George Washington Whistler}}
* [http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/people/biog/?bid=Whis_Gwa&firstname=George%20Washington&surname=Whistler Biographical sketch] of G. W. Whistler at the Center for Whistler Studies at the University of Glasgow, Scotland.
* American Society of Civil Engineers biographical sketch of [http://www.asce.org/templates/person-bio-detail.aspx?id=11231 George Washington Whistler] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160423195831/http://www.asce.org/templates/person-bio-detail.aspx?id=11231 |date=2016-04-23 }}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160810065917/http://keystonearches.org/ George W. Whistler's Stone Arches]
{{James McNeill Whistler|state=collapsed}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Whistler, George W.}}
[[Category:United States Military Academy alumni]]
[[Category:American surveyors]]
[[Category:American civil engineers]]
[[Category:American railroad pioneers]]
[[Category:19th-century American railroad executives]]
[[Category:Locomotive builders and designers]]
[[Category:People from Fort Wayne, Indiana]]
[[Category:Deaths from cholera]]
[[Category:1800 births]]
[[Category:1849 deaths]]
[[Category:American expatriates in the Russian Empire]]
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