James Harrison (17 April 1816 – 3 September 1893) was a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

Victorian newspaper printer, journalist, politician, and pioneer in the field of mechanical refrigeration. Harrison founded the ''

Geelong Advertiser The ''Geelong Advertiser'' is a daily newspaper circulating in Geelong, Victoria, Australia, the Bellarine Peninsula, and surrounding areas. First published on 21 November 1840, the ''Geelong Advertiser'' is the oldest newspaper title in Victor ...

'' newspaper and was a member of the Victorian Legislative Council and

Victorian Legislative Assembly The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Victoria in Australia; the upper house being the Victorian Legislative Council. Both houses sit at Parliament House in Spring Street, Melbourne. The presiding ...

. Harrison is also remembered as the inventor of the mechanical refrigeration process creating ice and founder of the Victorian Ice Works and as a result, is often called "the father of refrigeration". In 1873 he won a gold medal at the Melbourne Exhibition by proving that meat kept frozen for months remained perfectly edible.

Early life

James Harrison was born at Bonhill, Dunbartonshire, the son of a fisherman. Harrison attended

Anderson's University The University of Strathclyde ( gd, Oilthigh Shrath Chluaidh) is a public research university located in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded in 1796 as the Andersonian Institute, it is Glasgow's second-oldest university, having received its royal chart ...

and then the Glasgow Mechanics' Institution, specialising in chemistry. He trained as a printing apprentice in

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

and worked in London as a compositor before emigrating to

Sydney, Australia Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and List of cities in Oceania by population, Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metro ...

in 1837 to set up a printing press for the English company Tegg & Co. Moving to Melbourne in 1839 he found employment with

John Pascoe Fawkner John Pascoe Fawkner (20 October 1792 – 4 September 1869) was an early Australian pioneer, businessman and politician of Melbourne, Australia. In 1835 he financed a party of free settlers from Van Diemen's Land (now called Tasmania), to sail ...

as a compositor and later editor on Fawkner's ''Port Phillip Patriot''. When Fawkner acquired a new press, Harrison offered him 30 pounds for the original old press to start

Geelong Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in the southeastern Australian state of Victoria, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River, ...

's first newspaper. The first weekly edition of the ''

'' appeared November 1840: edited by 'James Harrison and printed and published for John Pascoe Fawkner (sole proprietor) by William Watkins...'. By November 1842, Harrison became sole owner.

Political career

Harrison was a member of Geelong's first town council in 1850 and represented

in the Victorian Legislative Council from November 1854 until its abolition in March 1856. Harrison then represented

1858–59 and

Geelong West Geelong West is a commercial and residential suburb of Geelong, Victoria, Australia. When Geelong was founded, the area was known as Kildare but its name was changed to Geelong West in 1875. The main street is Pakington Street. At the 2016 c ...

1859–60 in the

. As an editor he was an early advocate for tariff protection which later he brought to prominence when he was editor of ''

The Age ''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in Melbourne, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by Nine Entertainment, ''The Age'' primarily serves Victoria (Australia), Victoria, but copies also sell in Tasmania, the Austral ...

'' under the proprietorship of

David Syme David Syme (2 October 1827 – 14 February 1908) was a Scottish-Australian newspaper proprietor of ''The Age'' and regarded as "the father of protection in Australia" who had immense influence in the Government of Victoria.C. E. Sayers,Syme, Da ...

. But his rise ceased abruptly in 1854 after a controversial libel suit was brought against him by the Crown Prosecutor George Mackay whose evident drunkenness on duty Harrison had editorially deplored. The jury brought in a verdict for Mackay with Harrison to pay £800 damages. In 1862, although his assets were worth £22,000, he had to sell the ''Advertiser'' to escape bankruptcy. It was while he owned this paper from 1842 to 1862 that his interest in refrigeration and ice-making began to develop. Whilst cleaning

movable type Movable type (US English; moveable type in British English) is the system and technology of printing and typography that uses movable components to reproduce the elements of a document (usually individual alphanumeric characters or punctuatio ...

with

ether In organic chemistry, ethers are a class of compounds that contain an ether group—an oxygen atom connected to two alkyl or aryl groups. They have the general formula , where R and R′ represent the alkyl or aryl groups. Ethers can again be c ...

, he noticed that the evaporating fluid would leave the metal type cold to the touch.

Ice-making operation and later life

Harrison's first mechanical ice-making machine began operation in 1851 on the banks of the Barwon River at Rocky Point in

. Because of the cost of importing ice from the United States and Norway for use in ice houses, Harrison's device became a financially viable alternative for the remote Victoria colony, and his first commercial

ice-making machine An icemaker, ice generator, or ice machine may refer to either a consumer device for making ice, found inside a home freezer; a stand-alone appliance for making ice, or an industrial machine for making ice on a large scale. The term "ice machine ...

followed in 1854, along with a patent for an ether refrigeration system granted in 1855. This novel system used a compressor to force the refrigeration gas to pass through a condenser, where it cooled down and liquefied. The liquefied gas then circulated through the refrigeration coils and vaporised again, cooling down the surrounding system. The machine employed a 5 m (16 ft.) flywheel and produced of ice per day. In 1856 Harrison went to London where he patented both his process (747 of 1856) and his apparatus (2362 of 1857). Also in 1856, James Harrison, was commissioned by a brewery to build a machine that could cool beer. His system was almost immediately taken up by the brewing industry and was also widely used by meatpacking factories. Though Harrison had commercial success establishing a second ice company back in Sydney in 1860, he later entered the debate of how to compete against the American advantage of unrefrigerated beef sales to the United Kingdom. He wrote ''Fresh Meat frozen and packed as if for a voyage, so that the refrigerating process may be continued for any required period'', and in 1873 prepared the sailing ship ''Norfolk'' for an experimental beef shipment to the United Kingdom. His choice of a cold room system instead of installing a refrigeration system upon the ship itself proved disastrous when the ice was consumed faster than expected. The experiment failed, ruining public confidence in refrigerated meat at that time. He returned to journalism, becoming editor of the Melbourne ''Age'' in 1867. Harrison returned to Geelong in 1892 and died at his

Point Henry Moolap is a residential and industrial suburb of Geelong, Victoria, Australia. The name Moolap is derived from an Aboriginal word for nearby Point Henry, moo-laa, thought to mean 'men gathering to go fishing'. Moolap is located in the City of ...

home in 1893.

Legacy

The James Harrison Museum committee have acquired land at Rocky Point (the site of the first ice-making machine in the world) and are endeavouring to build a museum there. The Australian Institute of Refrigeration Air Conditioning and Heating's most distinguished award is the James Harrison Medal. The James Harrison bridge spanning the Barwon River in Geelong is named in his honour. A plaque located at 100 Franklin St, Melbourne commemorates the Victoria Ice Works founded by James Harrison in 1859. The centenary of refrigeration (1856-1956) was commemorated with a plaque in Ryrie Street,

Advertiser Building.

References

External links

Portrait of James Harrison
in

Geelong Art Gallery The Geelong Art Gallery, currently known as Geelong Gallery, is a major regional art gallery, gallery in the city of Geelong, Victoria, Geelong in Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. The gallery has over 6,000 works of art in its collectio ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Harrison, James 1816 births 1893 deaths 19th-century Australian engineers 19th-century Australian inventors Cooling technology Food preservation Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning Ice trade Members of the Victorian Legislative Council Members of the Victorian Legislative Assembly Politicians from Geelong People from Bonhill Scottish emigrants to colonial Australia 19th-century Australian politicians Scottish printers Alumni of the University of Strathclyde Australian newspaper editors Newspaper founders 19th-century Scottish businesspeople 19th-century Australian businesspeople