John Philip Holland

Holland, John Joseph (1776?–1820), scenic designer and architect. The English‐born artist was reputedly a pupil of Marinelli in London before being brought to America by Wignell to serve at Philadelphia's Chestnut Street Theatre. He later moved to New York, where he was largely responsible for the 1807 redesigning of the Park Theatre, at which he served for several seasons as principal scenic artist. In 1813 he left (temporarily) to become one of the leaders of the rebellious, short‐lived Theatrical Commonwealth. The Gothic settings he created for the Park's 1809 mounting of De Montfort are sometimes said to be the first American attempt at historical accuracy in scenery. William Dunlap suggested he was a slow, deliberate worker who insisted “an Artist was not bound to work by the hour like a mechanick,” whereas Joseph Ireland recalled, “He was an artist of great taste, and as a scenic and decorative painter, surpassed all who had been known before him in this country.”

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America's preeminent submarine pioneer was born at Liscannor, County Clare, Ireland, and educated by the Christian Brothers, who recognized his drafting skill and mechanical aptitude. As a parochial schoolteacher, Holland studied earlier efforts by William Bourne, David Bushnell, and Robert Fulton to construct underwater boats. Emigrating from famine‐ravaged Ireland in 1873, he secured teaching employment in Paterson, New Jersey, and won support from the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood to construct his first submersible, tested on the Passaic River in 1878. Similarly funded, he successfully demonstrated his Fenian Ram at New York in 1881. Gaining only limited official attention, not until 1895 did he win a contract to construct the navy's steam‐powered submersible Plunger.

Holland's advanced ideas on armament, hull form, and electric underwater propulsion were embodied in his Holland VI, the first modern submarine, constructed at Elizabethport, New Jersey, in 1897 and commissioned by the U.S. Navy as SS‐1 in 1900. Holland's Electric Boat Company secured navy contracts for five additional submersibles, followed by orders from Great Britain, Russia, and Japan. Simon Lake, Holland's principal design rival, entered mounting international competition with contracts for Russia, Austria, Germany, and in 1911 with the United States. Shuffled aside by Electric Boat management, Holland, father of the American and the British submarine, devoted his final years to aeronautical research.

[See also Submarines.]

Bibliography

• Frank T. Cable, The Birth and Development of the American Submarine, 1924.
• Richard K. Morris, John Holland, 1841–1914: Inventor of the Modern Submarine, 1966

John Philip Holland (1840-1914) was an Irish-American inventor who succeeded in developing the submarine sufficiently to win it a place in the navies of the world.

John P. Holland was born in County Clare, Ireland, where, after going to school in his native town and in Limerick, he became a schoolteacher. In 1873 he emigrated to New York and the following year became a teacher in Paterson, N.J.

Holland had long been fascinated by the possibilities of the submarine. Attempts to build such boats had been made off and on since the 17th century, and in 1775 the American patriot David Bushnell had been the first to use a submarine to attack an enemy ship. In 1800 Robert Fulton built and tested the first all-metal submarine. Holland, a partisan of Irish independence, hoped to perfect the craft so that it could be used against the British navy. By 1870, after studying the failures of others, he was ready with plans for a craft of his own. He was without funds, however, and it was not until going to America that he was able to revive his plans.

In New Jersey, Holland found that the Fenian Society (a group of Irish republicans) was willing to support his experiments, and in 1878 he was able to launch his first boat, a 14-foot submarine. In 1881 he built a full-sized submarine, called the Fenian Ram, which contained many features of the modern submarine.

Holland knew that the submarine would have to win approval from the U.S. Navy before it could be perfected, and after 1888 he made frequent bids to build a ship for the U.S. government. After several were built without his direct supervision, in 1898 he was able to launch the Holland, a ship nearly 54 feet long and equipped with batteries for underwater cruising. It was purchased by the government in 1900, and six more were ordered. Holland built similar ships for the navies of Japan, Great Britain, and Russia but was unable to maintain control of his own company. Like many other inventors, he had to exchange control of the firm for working capital. His last years were spent in making aeronautical experiments and investigations.

Holland died on Aug. 12, 1914, within a few days of the outbreak of World War I, the war which proved the effectiveness of his weapon.

Further Reading

A good, full-length biography of Holland is Richard Knowles Morris, John P. Holland, 1840-1914: Inventor of the Modern Submarine (1966). The larger story may be followed in Charles W. Rush and others, The Complete Book of Submarines (1958).

For other people named John Holland, see John Holland (disambiguation).

John Philip Holland

John Philip Holland (Irish: Seán Pilib Ó hUallacháin / Ó Maolchalann) (29 February 1840 – 12 August 1914^[1]) was an Irish engineer who developed the first submarine to be formally commissioned by the U.S. Navy, and the first Royal Navy submarine, the Holland 1.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Early life 1.2 Development of submarine designs 1.3 Death 2 Patents 3 References 4 Further reading 5 External links

History

Early life

He was one of four brothers who may have been born in Liscannor, County Clare, Ireland^[2] to an Irish speaking mother, Máire Ní Scannláin, and John Holland, and learned English properly only when he attended the local English-speaking National School system and, from 1858, in the Christian Brothers in Ennistymon.^[3] Holland joined the Irish Christian Brothers in Limerick and taught in Limerick and many other centers in the country including North Monastery CBS in Cork City. Due to ill health, he left the Christian Brothers in 1873.^[4]

Development of submarine designs

Holland emigrated to the United States in 1873. Initially working for an engineering firm, he returned to teaching again for a further six years in St. John’s Catholic School in Paterson, New Jersey. In 1875, his first submarine designs were submitted for consideration by the U.S. Navy, but turned down as unworkable. The Fenians, however, continued to fund Holland's research and development expenses at a level that allowed him to resign from his teaching post. In 1881, Fenian Ram was launched, but soon after, Holland and the Fenians parted company angrily, primarily due to issues of payment within the Fenian organization, and between the Fenians and Holland.^[5] The submarine is now preserved at Paterson Museum, New Jersey.

Holland stands in the hatch of a submarine.

Holland continued to improve his designs and worked on several experimental boats, prior to his successful efforts with a privately built type, launched on 17 May 1897. This was the first submarine having power to run submerged for any considerable distance, and the first to combine electric motors for submerged travel and gasoline engines for use on the surface. She was purchased by the U.S. Navy, on 11 April 1900, after rigorous tests and was commissioned on 12 October 1900 as USS Holland. Six more of her type were ordered and built at the Crescent Shipyard in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The company that emerged from under these developments was called The Electric Boat Company, founded on 7 February 1899. Isaac Leopold Rice became the company's first President with Elihu B. Frost acting as vice president and chief financial officer.

The USS Holland design was also adopted by others, including the Royal Navy in developing the Holland-class submarine. The Imperial Japanese Navy employed a modified version of the basic design for their first five submarines, although these submarines were at least 10 feet longer at about 63 feet. These submarines were also developed at the Fore River Ship and Engine Company in Quincy, MA.^{[citation needed]}

John Philip Holland also designed the Holland II and Holland III prototypes.

Death

After spending 57 of his 74 years working with submersibles, John Philip Holland died on 12 August 1914 in Newark, New Jersey. Holland is interred at the Holy Sepulchre Cemetery in Totowa, New Jersey.

Patents

• U.S. Patent 239,046 Screw Propeller
• U.S. Patent 337,000 Hydrocarbon Engine
• U.S. Patent 472,670 Submergible
• U.S. Patent 491,051 Submarine Gun
• U.S. Patent 492,960 Steering Apparatus
• U.S. Patent 522,177 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 537,113 Submerigible Boat
• U.S. Patent 681,221 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 681,222 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 683,400 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 684,429 Visual Indicator
• U.S. Patent 693,272 Auto Dive Mechanism
• U.S. Patent 694,153 Auto Ballast
• U.S. Patent 694,154 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 694,643 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 696,971 Firing Valve
• U.S. Patent 696,972 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 702,728 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 702,729 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 706,561 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 708,552 Submarine Gun
• U.S. Patent 708,553 Submarine Boat
• U.S. Patent 815,350 Submarine Boat

References

1. ^ John Philip Holland article, Encyclopaedia Britannica
2. ^ Source: Lecture by Pat Sweeney, Maritime Institute of Ireland 16 January 2009: His father was a member of the Coastguard and occupied a coastguard cottage. There were no coastguard cottages or station in Liscannor.
3. ^ http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http://www.geocities.com/gwmccue/People/Holland_John.html&date=2009-10-25+23:37:46 Holland's background and childhood in Clare and Limerick
4. ^ The Phoenix, Clare Champion, Friday August 9, 1996
5. ^ Davies, R. Nautilus: The Story of Man Under the Sea. Naval Institute Press. 1995. ISBN 1-55750-615-9.

• John Philip Holland, Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998.
• Who Built Those Subs? Naval History Magazine, Oct. 1998 125th Anniversary issue, pp. 31–34. Richard Knowles Morris PhD. Published by the USNI Annapolis, MD.^{[unreliable source?]}
• International Directory of Company Histories, Volume 86 under General Dynamics/Electric Boat Corporation, July, 2007. Pages 136-139. Published by St. James Press/Thomposon Gale Group.
• The Defender, The Story of General Dynamics, by Roger Franklin. Published by Harper & Row 1986.^{[unreliable source?]}
• The Submarine in War and Peace by Simon Lake, published in 1918 by J. P. Lippincott, Philadelphia, PA. See pages 113-118.

Further reading

• Morris, Richard (1998). John P. Holland, 1841-1914: Inventor of the Modern Submarine. Columbia, S.C: University of South Carolina Press. ISBN 1-57003-236-X. http://books.google.com/books?id=_rX-eHagIggC&dq=Morris+John+P.+Holland:&output=html&cad=0. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: John Philip Holland

• Electric Boat/General Dynamics web site with information on John P. Holland and others who were present during the foundation of this company
• Holland's Submarines Photos of John Holland's Submarine #1 and the Fenian Ram at the Paterson Museum.
• John Philip Holland (1841-1914) And His Submarines by Gary McCue
• Aidan Harney Playwright Aidan Harney wrote the play: "Submarine Man: the little known life of John Philip Holland" in 2008 and it had two national tours in Ireland.

Persondata
Name	Holland, John Philip
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	29 February 1840
Place of birth
Date of death	12 August 1914
Place of death

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