William Deidrick
William Deidrick was an American inventor from Selma, California. He was a co-inventor of the Fresno Scraper, the machine that became the basis of most modern earth-moving equipment. On April 17, 1883, Deidrick received U.S. Patent 275,893 for his horse-drawn scraper, which was a variation on the Buck Scraper, invented by James Porteous of Fresno, California. Porteous, originally a manufacturer of wagons, purchased Deidrick's patent, and also one held jointly by Frank Dusy and Abijah McCall as he perfected the machine, an important tool in the building of the Panama Canal The Panama Canal ( es, Canal de Panamá, link=no) is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and divides North and South America. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a conduit ..., among many other uses. References Year of birth missing Year of death missing 19th-century American inventors People from Selma, California {{US-i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Selma, California
Selma is a city in Fresno County, California. The population was 23,319 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, up from 19,240 at the 2000 United States Census, 2000 census. Selma is located southeast of Fresno, California, Fresno, at an elevation of 308 feet (94 m). Geography According to the United States Census Bureau, the city covers an area of , all of it land. Demographics 2010 At the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census Selma had a population of 23,219. The population density was . The racial makeup of Selma was 12,869 (55.4%) White, 284 (1.2%) African American, 479 (2.1%) Native American, 1,057 (4.6%) Asian, 9 (0.0%) Pacific Islander, 7,630 (32.9%) from other races, and 891 (3.8%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 18,014 persons (77.6%). The census reported that 23,054 people (99.3% of the population) lived in households, 50 (0.2%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 115 (0.5%) were institutionalized. There were 6,4 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Engineering Vehicle
Heavy equipment or heavy machinery refers to heavy-duty vehicles specially designed to execute construction tasks, most frequently involving earthwork operations or other large construction tasks. ''Heavy equipment'' usually comprises five equipment systems: the implement, traction, structure, power train, and control/information. Heavy equipment has been used since at least the 1st century BC when the ancient Roman engineer Vitruvius described a crane in ''De architectura'' when it was powered via human or animal labor. Heavy equipment functions through the mechanical advantage of a simple machine, the ratio between input force applied and force exerted is multiplied, making tasks which could take hundreds of people and weeks of labor without heavy equipment far less intensive in nature. Some equipment uses hydraulic drives as a primary source of motion. The term "plant" is used to refer to any mobile type of heavy machinery. History The use of heavy equipment has ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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James Porteous
James Porteous (1848–1922) was the Scottish-American inventor of the Fresno scraper. James Porteous was born in Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland. His father, William Porteous, had been a wheelwright and blacksmith who built and repaired carriages, wagons and farm equipment. After learning his basic skills, James Porteous emigrated to the United States in 1873, at the age of 25, and settled in Santa Barbara, California. In 1877, he moved to Fresno and established a wagon shop, where he prospered, manufacturing buggies and heavy wagons. Having worked with farmers, Porteous recognised the dependence of the San Joaquin Valley on irrigation and the requirement for a more efficient means of constructing canals and ditches in the sandy soil, and he went about the task of devising an earth moving scraper for that purpose. Porteous invented an improvement on the simple buckboard, a horse-drawn earth scraper, and refined his Buck Scraper, as he first called it, through several ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fresno, California
Fresno () is a major city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley region. It covers about and had a population of 542,107 in 2020, making it the fifth-most populous city in California, the most populous inland city in California, and the 34th-most populous city in the nation. The Metro population of Fresno is 1,008,654 as of 2022. Named for the abundant ash trees lining the San Joaquin River, Fresno was founded in 1872 as a railway station of the Central Pacific Railroad before it was incorporated in 1885. It has since become an economic hub of Fresno County and the San Joaquin Valley, with much of the surrounding areas in the Metropolitan Fresno region predominantly tied to large-scale agricultural production. Fresno is near the geographic center of California, approximately north of Los Angeles, south of the state capital, Sacramento, and southeast of San Franc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Frank Dusy
Frank Dusy (December 17, 1837 – November 9, 1898) was an early business leader of Selma, California and a co-inventor of the Fresno Scraper, the basis of most modern earth-moving machinery. On June 16, 1885, Dusy and his partner Abijah McCall were issued U.S. Patent 320,055, for their improvement on the Buck Scraper, invented by James Porteous of Fresno, California. Porteous, originally a wagon builder, purchased their patent and one held by William Deidrick as he perfected his machine. Dusy was also among the original investors in the ''Fresno Republican'' newspaper, which was eventually acquired by and combined with the ''Fresno Bee ''The Fresno Bee'' is a daily newspaper serving Fresno, California, and surrounding counties in that U.S. state's central San Joaquin Valley. It is owned by The McClatchy Company and ranks fourth in circulation among the company's newspapers. I ...''. External links * 1837 births 1898 deaths 19th-century American inventors American man ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Abijah McCall
Abijah McCall was a co-inventor of the Fresno Scraper, a horse-drawn (and later, tractor-drawn) earth-moving machine upon which modern road- and canal-building equipment is based. Along with his partner Frank Dusy, McCall devised an improvement on the Buck Scraper, invented by James Porteous. On June 15, 1885, McCall and Dusy received U.S. Patent 320,055 for their version of the scraper. Porteous purchased the patents held by Dusy and McCall and also a patent held by William Deidrick as he perfected the scraper, which Porteous also manufactured at his factory in Fresno, California. The scraper was widely used in the Western United States and also put into use by U.S. engineers building the Panama Canal. Deidrick, Dusy, and McCall were all early residents of Selma, California Selma is a city in Fresno County, California. The population was 23,319 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, up from 19,240 at the 2000 United States Census, 2000 census. Selma is located southe ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Panama Canal
The Panama Canal ( es, Canal de Panamá, link=no) is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and divides North and South America. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a conduit for maritime trade. One of the largest and most difficult engineering projects ever undertaken, the Panama Canal shortcut greatly reduces the time for ships to travel between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, enabling them to avoid the lengthy, hazardous Cape Horn route around the southernmost tip of South America via the Drake Passage or Strait of Magellan and the even less popular route through the Arctic Archipelago and the Bering Strait. Colombia, France, and later the United States controlled the territory surrounding the canal during construction. France began work on the canal in 1881, but stopped because of lack of investors' confidence due to engineering problems and a high worker mortality rate. The United States took over the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Year Of Birth Missing
A year or annus is the orbital period of a planetary body, for example, the Earth, moving in its orbit around the Sun. Due to the Earth's axial tilt, the course of a year sees the passing of the seasons, marked by change in weather, the hours of daylight, and, consequently, vegetation and soil fertility. In temperate and subpolar regions around the planet, four seasons are generally recognized: spring, summer, autumn and winter. In tropical and subtropical regions, several geographical sectors do not present defined seasons; but in the seasonal tropics, the annual wet and dry seasons are recognized and tracked. A calendar year is an approximation of the number of days of the Earth's orbital period, as counted in a given calendar. The Gregorian calendar, or modern calendar, presents its calendar year to be either a common year of 365 days or a leap year of 366 days, as do the Julian calendars. For the Gregorian calendar, the average length of the calendar year (the mea ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Year Of Death Missing
A year or annus is the orbital period of a planetary body, for example, the Earth, moving in its orbit around the Sun. Due to the Earth's axial tilt, the course of a year sees the passing of the seasons, marked by change in weather, the hours of daylight, and, consequently, vegetation and soil fertility. In temperate and subpolar regions around the planet, four seasons are generally recognized: spring, summer, autumn and winter. In tropical and subtropical regions, several geographical sectors do not present defined seasons; but in the seasonal tropics, the annual wet and dry seasons are recognized and tracked. A calendar year is an approximation of the number of days of the Earth's orbital period, as counted in a given calendar. The Gregorian calendar, or modern calendar, presents its calendar year to be either a common year of 365 days or a leap year of 366 days, as do the Julian calendars. For the Gregorian calendar, the average length of the calendar year (the me ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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19th-century American Inventors
The 19th (nineteenth) century began on 1 January 1801 ( MDCCCI), and ended on 31 December 1900 ( MCM). The 19th century was the ninth century of the 2nd millennium. The 19th century was characterized by vast social upheaval. Slavery was abolished in much of Europe and the Americas. The First Industrial Revolution, though it began in the late 18th century, expanding beyond its British homeland for the first time during this century, particularly remaking the economies and societies of the Low Countries, the Rhineland, Northern Italy, and the Northeastern United States. A few decades later, the Second Industrial Revolution led to ever more massive urbanization and much higher levels of productivity, profit, and prosperity, a pattern that continued into the 20th century. The Islamic gunpowder empires fell into decline and European imperialism brought much of South Asia, Southeast Asia, and almost all of Africa under colonial rule. It was also marked by the collapse of the large S ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |