SIR HIRAM MAXIM

Evening Star, Issue 22575, 17 February 1937, Page 6

SIR HIRAM MAXIM

GENIUS THROUGH EYES OF SOH When I referred to the ‘ Encyclopaedia Britannica ’ to refresh my memory of the achievements of Sir Hiram Maxim, I found only the meagre information that he was the brother of Hudson Maxim, and invented the Maxim machine gun (*' nt f s Edward Shanks, in the Loudon ‘ Sunday Times, ( reviewing ( A Genius in the Fami y, by Hiram P. Maxim). But surely a great man is not iorgotten as easily as that. Does no one now think of Hiram Maxim, as I did when I was a hoy, as a legendary figure, second, only, in that particular field ot legend, to Thomas Alva Edison, himself? The machine gun alone was a matter of very considerable importance. It gave us the Battle of Omdurman, in which one ot our most formidable enemies was destroyed with casualties on our side ot under 500. That made the British public think highly of Hiram Maxim. . But it was not all, since he was the man who one day , was going tony. HU experiment with a,, steam-driven aeroplane running on rails and kept from rising by guides above it met with a good deal of jeering. But those (and there were some) who believed that flying would some day be possible believed also that Manm was the man to do it..' The public at large, ■while it laughed at Maxim, kept On attentive eye o.n him. . , , He never flew, but he invented a ' contraption called “ Sir Hiram Maxim e flying machines,” which became one or the “ attractions ” of the annual exhibition at Earl Court. Devoted as 1 •was to the thought that Maxim would fly one day, and never having considered that it might be at first an alarming business, I persuaded my father to take me up. I have never been so frightened in all my life as I was that day, certainly not when, much later, I first went up in an aeroplane. The contraption consisted of a number of open boats suspended' by wire ropes from a central pole, which rotated with increasing rapidity until the boats swung out so far that the unfortunate passenger felt that his body was parallel with the ground. He was, of course, quite safe, since he was kept in his seat by centrifugal force. I knew enough about elementary science to know that, but all the same I finished the trip with a burning resentment against Sir Hiram Maxim and an urgent desire to express it to , him. I felt that he had (though in a far from literal sense) let one of his admirers' down—l could, as a matter of fact, have borne to be let dotvn sooner. Now, more than 20 years later, I learn for the first time that it was an immense pity that I did not follow my first impulse and send Sir Hiram a letter of remonstrance. He would certainly have been delighted by it, he would almost certainly have written a frave reply, and a good time would ave been enjoyed by all. The Sight of the hero’s signature would have dissolved my resentment and he would have chuckled for days at the thought of a good trick played on a small boy. * AN UNUSUAL FATHER. This side of his character is revealed in a book which has made me chuckle more than any but three or four that I have read in the, last couple of years. Hiram Percy Maxim, who died shortly after this hook was completed, would have been perfectly competent to write a book on his father’s contributions to practical science. He was himself an inventor. To him the world owes the “ silencer,” fixed to firearms, which has beCn such a boon to the writers of crook novels and plays if to no one else of any honesty at all. When he was asked why he had let loose this obviously undesirable thing on the world, he replied, with what we can now see to be a quirk of the characteristic family humour, that he was very sorry, but he had not been able to help it—he supposed it must be in his blood. But instead of the scientific estimate which he might have made, the author preferred to give us a picture of Hiram Maxim as he seemed to a small boy who was his son. “ I suspect,” he says on his first page, ” I had one of the most unusual fathers anybody ever had. I was his first-born. He knew considerably less than nothing about children, and he had to learn how to be a father. He learned on me.” And ho concludes by saying: I think it must bo conceded that ho was an unusual father, and that being his first-born was an unusual experience. In this picture I have confined myself to his intimate family life. I have attempted to show that he had an extremely attractive side, and also an extremely difficult one. He had a brilliancy which sparkled, a masterful cleverness and resourcefulness /that placed him above any other man 1 ever knew. But he never quite learned how to be a father. All that is hero asked can be conceded. I display only the last sentence, with the question ” Does anyone? ” Hiram Maxim, on the evidence of this hook, seems to have had as good an introduction to life as any boy could expect. Let us take a few examples. The young Percy conceived an intense longing for the drug-store man’s little white dog, and hinted at it so often that at last the drug-store man said he would sell the dog for a penny with a head on each side. Percy’s earnest search for such a penny attracted his father’s attention, so— A very busy man in New York, with heavy responsibilities resting upon his shoulders, went into his factory toolroom, put a penny in a lathe and faced off the “ tail ” side of it. until it was just half the thickness of a normal penny. Then he repeated the operation with another penny, which gave him two halfpennies. He then soldered these two thin halfpennies together, thereby producing a coin of normal thickness, but with a head on both sides. When the edge had been burnished, the joint could not be seen, whereupon he , probably smiled and placed the unique coin in his pocket. Percy, I regret to say, did not get the dog, but Hiram had had his joke and had made the drug-store man look very foolish. THE MUSIC-BOX. On another occasion he challenged a man who wanted to pray for his soul to show the efficacy of nis prayers by stopping a music-box with them. The music-box was so constructed as to play 10 tunes Every time it came to-the end of a tune and paused, my heart stopped beating, wondering if it were going to start the next tune. The strain was terrible on me. When it finished the ninth tune there seemed to be an especially long pause and I became very tense indeed. I think my father was going through the same experience, because he paid very close attention during the pauses between tunes. But the music-box began the tenth and last tune and my father announced, “ This is the tenth and the last tune.” At this critical moment the unexpected happened. My mother walked

into, the room, A look of surprise immediately spread over her face. Neither my father nor I had expected this. The dear lady could make neither head nor tail of the picture which presented itself. What looked like a tramp was kneeling in the centre of her parlour, hands clasped, rolling his eyes to heaven and praying soulfully; our music-box was galloping through a gay little tune; her husband was sitting in a chair, grinning from ear to ear; her son was sitting in another chair, probably staring his eyes out. The end of that story was that the music-box did not stop, the prayermaker got 25 cents to buy himself a meal, and Mrs Maxim was left, as so often, wondering what sort of a man she had married.

In this episode there is more than a little flavour of Mark Twain., Another makes one think of a mixture of Mark Twain and, Edison. Percy broke his mother’s pier-glass, and she declared that he had grown out of her control and that his father must give him a good whipping. After supper, Hiram announced that he was ready to attend to the matter:—

He led the way out into the back yard, where we visited my mother’s shrubs and bushes, from which a suitable whip was to be cut. My father had his pocket knife open, ready to cut when he found a stalk that met the requirements. He explained to me that it was necessary to find one that had just the right length and thickness and straightness. . . We searched and searched; without finding anything that just suited. I became interested in the problem and pointed out several likely-looking sticks which appeared as though they might answer the exacting specifications.

They returned to the house and tried a number of specimens—on the coverlet of Hiram’s bed, making a noise loud enough to suggest to Mrs Maxim that her son was being flayed alive. Then, high and disposedly, they, discussed and dismissed the possibilities of baseball bats and broomsticks. At last Hiram stated his definite opinion that, as they could not find what they wanted, the projected whipping would have to be abandoned; he added a hope that Percy would try to be a better boy. Percy says that lie both tried and succeeded, which I find easy to believe. And the whole story is like a magnificent parody, written by Mark Twain, of Edison’s search for the perfect filament for the electric bulb.