November 1st Michael Loam (Birth)
     

Michael Loam (1797 – 1871) was the Cornish engineer who introduced the first man engine to transport miners up and down a mineshaft.

Until the mid 19th century, miners would ascend or descend a shaft using 10-foot ladders resting on platforms.  Huge numbers of shafts were many hundreds of feet in depth with some levels extending, horizontally, a mile or more under the sea.

Ascending the ladders, carrying their tools, at the end of a long shift in dirty, hot environments often led to exhausted miners falling off the ladders to their death.  When that happened, it could lead to miners below also being knocked off the ladder and it has been estimated that more miners died in this manner than in shaft and tunnel collapses and water ingress.

Consequently, in 1834, the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society (April 22nd) offered a prize for the design of a better system of transporting miners up and down the mineshafts.  In 1841, Loam won the competition for his design of a mechanical lift. 

This saved many lives but was also the cause of the Levant Mining Disaster (October 20th) which cost thirty one lives when a cable snapped just as some of the miners were close to the surface.

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