John Wilkinson

From a farming background in Cumbria, John Wilkinson's remarkable abilities and ambitions ensured his rise to pre-eminence among the gifted pioneers of the industrial revolution. His colleagues and friends were similarly talented characters, including James Watt, Josiah Wedgwood, Richard Crawshay and Thomas Telford. Wilkinson achieved great leaps in the iron industry and munitions, including the first use of sound castings and accurate boring for cannon manufacture, but he was also influential i