Pavel Nikolayevich Yablochkov. Works, Documents, Materials. Published by the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Moscow, 1954, 463 pp. Price 29 rubles 50 kopecks.

Among the outstanding figures of world science and technology, one of the most honorable places belongs to the Russian electrical engineer Pavel Nikolayevich Yablochkov. Through his works he created an entire epoch in the history of electrical engineering and exerted an enormous influence on its subsequent development. Over the last 50–60 years quite a few articles and individual monographs have been written about his life and work. Nevertheless, many aspects of the multifaceted scientific and practical activity of P. N. Yablochkov have remained insufficiently studied. This situation arose because, until recently, not all the materials on the life and creative work of this remarkable electrical engineer had been brought together and made available for research.

A new and valuable contribution has recently been made to Soviet scientific literature devoted to the history of world science and technology: by resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, the Academy of Sciences has published a collection of the works, materials, and documents of P. N. Yablochkov.

The material published in the present collection was gathered and prepared for printing by Prof. L. D. Bel’kind. He also made the translations from foreign languages and compiled the chronological, subject, and name indexes. The collection was edited by Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR M. A. Shatelen.

The collection consists of six sections. The first contains articles, reports, and letters by P. N. Yablochkov which, to a considerable extent, have become a bibliographic rarity, since they were published in 1876–1885 in little-circulated foreign editions and were not reprinted thereafter. In this same section, an autobiographical letter by the scientist is published for the first time; it apparently dates from 1892, and attached to it is a protocol from 1885 in which certain considerations of P. N. Yablochkov on methods of transmitting electrical energy over distance are set forth.

In the second section, which occupies more than a quarter of the total volume of the collection, are placed the texts of patents and privileges for the inventions of P. N. Yablochkov, taken from official publications issued by the Department of Trade and Manufactures of the Ministry of Finance of Russia and by the patent offices of France, Germany, and England. In all, this section contains 55 patent documents. Most of them (obtained abroad) are printed in Russian for the first time.

The articles, reports, letters, patents, and privileges published in the first and second sections of the reviewed collection by no means exhaust the richest scientific legacy left by P. N. Yablochkov. However, all his most important works are here for the first time gathered together with great completeness and reproduced with great scientific accuracy.

Each work by P. N. Yablochkov has been carefully annotated by the compiler of the collection. In the comments, the dates of writing of the works are established (if the date was not given by the author), valuable information is reported about the circumstances of their creation and publication, the significance of individual works of the scientist is emphasized, and exhaustive bibliographical references are given.

It is difficult to assess in a short article all the wealth of thoughts and ideas contained in the works of P. N. Yablochkov. Among the large number of P. N. Yablochkov’s varied inventions, his most outstanding creation in terms of historical significance was undoubtedly the electric candle. Simple in design and ingenious in its construction, it was the first to make it possible to solve the problem of electric lighting and gave a powerful impetus to the further improvement of electric light sources and methods of illumination. “...Under the banner of this candle,” wrote V. N. Chikolev, “Yablochkov, with tireless energy, persistence, and consistency, raised electric lighting up by the ears and set it on the pedestal belonging to it. If later electric lighting gained credit in society, if its progress, supported by the public’s trust, then proceeded by giant steps, if thousands of workers, among whom the famous names of Siemens, Edison, and others figure, rushed to improve this lighting, then in all this the world is indebted to our compatriot Yablochkov.”

The works of P. N. Yablochkov connected with the practical application and spread of electric lighting, as is known, in addition to numerous energetic supporters, also had many opponents, especially among the owners of gas companies. The erudition of the inventor in questions of economics helped him, by means of careful calculations, convincingly to prove that electric lighting was a highly promising method, a method which, after further improvement, would become not only the most convenient but also the most economical. In particular, P. N. Yablochkov came to the conclusion that the lighting of industrial premises and railway stations would make it possible to increase labor productivity, reduce injuries, and help improve the quality of production.

P. N. Yablochkov’s great service to his Motherland and to world science also lies in the fact that, earlier than other scientists, he solved the problem of “splitting up electric light,” built the transformer, and introduced alternating current into industry.

P. N. Yablochkov’s works in the field of electrical machine building are also of interest. As the documents and materials published in the reviewed collection testify, over the course of six years P. N. Yablochkov created a number of new, highly original alternating-current generators and motors, including an inductor machine that has preserved its basic features even in our time.

Blazing new trails in electrical machine building, P. N. Yablochkov showed himself not only as an innovator-inventor, but also as a talented technologist striving to create highly technological, economical designs of machines in manufacture and operation. Extremely indicative in this respect is the following thought expressed by the scientist in the first lines of the patent description of the dynamo-electric machine he invented, called “ecliptic”: “Always pursuing the same goal, consisting in the possible greatest simplification of the construction of dynamo-electric machines, I have devised a new system, which is ...”

“which is the subject of the present invention.” At the end of the same patent the author states: “Besides the simplicity which my system presents from a constructive point of view, it should be noted as its advantage that it does not require great precision in assembly.”

In his search for a cheap and reliable source of electric current, alongside the invention of the dynamo P. N. Yablochkov worked with genuine passion, and studied much and persistently, on the improvement of galvanic cells and the creation of new accumulator designs.

A careful analysis of the articles, reports, patents, and privileges published in the first and second sections of the collection shows that P. N. Yablochkov was not only an outstanding inventor, but also a serious, thoughtful physicist-researcher, a talented and indefatigable experimenter.

In his theoretical and experimental work, in his scientific foresight concerning the paths of development of electrical engineering, P. N. Yablochkov rose above the overwhelming majority of the scientists of his time. His extraordinary perspicacity opened to his view the prospects for the development of electrical engineering for many decades ahead. Thus, for example, in 1879, several years before Edison, who built the first electric power station in New York, P. N. Yablochkov came to the firm conviction that electric energy could and should be produced centrally. “Lighting can be produced without placing the machine in the house at all, but by using current as one uses gas or water,” the scientist categorically asserted. In 1885 P. N. Yablochkov put forward a fundamentally new and extraordinarily important idea: that the transmission of electric energy over distance should be carried out by means of high-voltage alternating current.

Solving technical problems of great historical significance, advancing numerous ideas and proposals that considerably outstripped the state of science, technology, and industry of his time, P. N. Yablochkov endured with difficulty life in a foreign land, the dull indifference of the official-bureaucratic and financial circles of tsarist Russia to his inventions and labors. One cannot read without emotion the autobiographical letter by the scientist that has come down to us and is published for the first time in the present collection, in which he reveals the sources of his life’s drama, full of romantic daring, emotional turmoil, material privation and sacrifice, and bitter disappointments. “Having worked all my life on industrial inventions on which many people have made fortunes,” the scientist wrote in the aforementioned letter in 1892, “I did not strive for wealth, but I counted, at least, on having enough to arrange for myself a laboratory in which I could work not for industry, but on purely scientific questions that interest me. And I might perhaps have brought benefit to science, as I did to industry, but my unsecured position compels me to abandon this thought...”

A significant place in the published collection (Section III) is occupied by technical notes and articles on the works of P. N. Yablochkov, published in the last quarter of the past century. In selecting materials for this section of the collection, Prof. L. D. Bel’kind used everything most valuable that had been written in Russia and abroad and that expressed the assessment and attitude of P. N. Yablochkov’s contemporaries toward his many-sided creativity and numerous inventions. The published Russian and foreign scientific and technical articles tell of the tremendous success of P. N. Yablochkov’s inventions, show the exceptional attention paid to his works in all countries, and reveal the worldwide significance of the scientist’s contribution to electrical engineering.

Of great interest are the personal documents of P. N. Yablochkov published for the first time in the fourth section of the collection, and the obituaries and memoir materials gathered in the fifth section of the reviewed collection. On becoming acquainted with them, there is inevitably recreated before the reader’s eyes—

Bibliography

... a vivid image of a modest and indefatigable worker, an ardent patriot, an energetic and enterprising public figure.

The scholar’s public activity, according to the recollections of his contemporaries, friends, and relatives, was as many-sided and fruitful as his scientific activity. Concerned for the progress of domestic and world science and technology, he took an active part in organizing the first special exhibition on electrical engineering in 1880 in Petersburg; his voice was heard more than once from the rostrum of international congresses of electricians; he was the organizer of the Russian pavilion at the World Exhibition in Paris; with his direct participation the International Society of Electricians was organized and the publication of the journal Electricity in Russia was begun.

The combination in P. N. Yablochkov of a major progressive scientist and a remarkable person largely determined his enormous popularity and the universal recognition accorded him. He was an honorary member of the Society of Lovers of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnography at Moscow University; a full member of the French Physical Society; deputy chairman of the VI (electrotechnical) section of the Russian Technical Society.

P. N. Yablochkov, as the memoir materials eloquently testify, was not only a major scientist and public figure, but also a man of noble soul and captivating warmth, a man of great gratitude and love toward people. He lived a large creative life, full of broad public interests, rich in fruitful deeds. Yet during P. N. Yablochkov’s lifetime his services were recognized, as is evident from the documents cited in the volume, only by the Russian Technical Society, which awarded him an honorary medal; by the Society of Lovers of Natural Science, Anthropology, and Ethnography, which awarded him the Society’s Large Gold Medal; and by the French government, which awarded the “Russian engineer Yablochkov” the Order of the Legion of Honor. P. N. Yablochkov’s activity received its true assessment only under Soviet power.

Of considerable interest are the materials published in the sixth and concluding section of the reviewed collection: sketches of P. N. Yablochkov’s life and activity. Here the reader will find one of the best biographies of the talented inventor, written by L. D. Belkind. Despite its small size, the biography fully reveals P. N. Yablochkov’s intensive work in Russia and abroad, explains the significance of his most important inventions, acquaints the reader with the inventor’s experimental work and the evolution of his scientific views, and as a whole gives a broad idea of the great contribution to electrical engineering made by P. N. Yablochkov. The sketch rightly notes P. N. Yablochkov’s priority in solving a number of the most important problems of electrical engineering, and outlines his outstanding public-scientific activity.

The substantial sketch belonging to the pen of the editor of the collection, M. A. Shatelen, who personally knew and associated with P. N. Yablochkov, very convincingly shows his historical merits in the development of electric lighting and the distribution of electrical energy. A vivid characterization of P. N. Yablochkov’s works in the field of electromachinery is given in his sketch by Prof. Yu. S. Chetet. The sketch by Academician A. N. Frumkin, “P. N. Yablochkov’s Works on Chemical Sources of Current,” also contains much, enabling the reader to evaluate more deeply the progressive character of the inventor’s ideas and labors.

The collection, unfortunately, is not without certain shortcomings. Among them should be noted the absence of an independent sketch, “P. N. Yablochkov as Experimenter,” which would have shown him as a talented master of experiment. It would have been more appropriate to arrange Yablochkov’s patents and privileges not in chronological order, but by subject ...

of inventions with the corresponding commentaries and reviews by contemporaries—would then be more useful for the reader in the history of each invention and the evolution of the inventor’s scientific views. However, the shortcomings noted do not diminish the value of the collection.

On the whole, as a result of the great work done by L. D. Bel’kind, the collection under review gives the Soviet reader the opportunity to become deeply and comprehensively acquainted with the scientific ideas, views, and methodology of P. N. Yablochkov’s work, to trace and understand the creative history of his numerous inventions, helps one to reassess their historical significance and to clarify the influence of his work on the development of electrical engineering.

There can be no doubt that, on the basis of a careful study of the works, documents, and materials collected together and published for the first time in the collection, Soviet scholars will write many new studies on individual, still unstudied and unrevealed aspects of P. N. Yablochkov’s activity.

In conclusion, the good technical presentation of the book should be noted. A pleasant impression is made by the strict, calm binding, the excellently reproduced numerous photographs and drawings, the good quality of the paper, and the clear typeface convenient for reading. In everything one senses the care of the Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR that the legacy of the outstanding Russian scientist should be presented to the reader in a worthy form.

The publication of the collection of works, documents, and materials of P. N. Yablochkov is a genuine gift to wide circles of Soviet readers, research workers, teachers, students, physicists, electrical engineers, historians of science, and many workers in other specialties.

I. B. Litinetskii