Description:
A compelling account of the life of one of the great pioneers of electrical science Oliver Heaviside (1850-1925). He showed how to analyse circuit, how to rid telephone lines of distortion and interpreted Maxwell's theory of electromagnetism in a way that working engineers and physicists could understand.
Brief description:
A former officer in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, Basil Mahon is a retired Government Statistician who ran the 1991 census in England and Wales and has had a lifelong passion for the physical sciences. Oliver Heaviside follows up his acclaimed book The Man Who Changed Everything, a biography of Heaviside's own hero James Clerk Maxwell.
Review Quotes:
'an engaging account of this heady, confusing period when electromagnetism was a young science and Heaviside was one of its greatest - and most eccentric - exponents. For Heaviside's relative obscurity was at least partly his own fault. Although he could be witty and even charming to his friends, he was also a thoroughly awkward individual who bore grudges like a champion, speckled his scientific articles with thinly veiled attacks on his enemies and repeatedly rejected pleas to make his papers more understandable.
Mahon is clearly sympathetic to his subject, but he does not shrink from the more challenging aspects of either Heaviside's character or his science. This slim volume is an excellent introduction to both.'
-- "Physics World"