The Author offers the following book as a continuation, in a more generally accessible form, of the Series of Memoirs of Industrial Men introduced in his Lives of the Engineers.

While preparing that work he frequently came across the tracks of celebrated inventors, mechanics, and iron-workers--the founders, in a great measure, of the modern industry of Britain--whose labours seemed to him well worthy of being traced out and placed on record, and the more so as their lives presented many points of curious and original interest.

Having been encouraged to prosecute the subject by offers of assistance from some of the most eminent living mechanical engineers, he is now enabled to present the following further series of memoirs to the public.
Without exaggerating the importance of this class of biography, it may at least be averred that it has not yet received its due share of attention.

While commemorating the labours and honouring the names of those who have striven to elevate man above the material and mechanical, the labours of the important industrial class to whom society owes so much of its comfort and well-being are also entitled to consideration.

Without derogating from the biographic claims of those who minister to intellect and taste, those who minister to utility need not be overlooked.