Safe Speed Forums

The original speed fiend
By David Newble - Friday, December 30, 2011

Henry House at the wheel of his LiFu Steam Wagonette.
WIGHT LIVINGHE was one of the Victorian age’s greatest inventors. From developing the original technology for baking and packing Shredded Wheat to inventing a steam driven 'horseless carriage’ it seemed that nothing was beyond the restless and fertile mind of American genius, entrepreneur and latterly Island resident and businessman, Henry Alonzo House.
Tucked away at the junction of York Avenue and New Barn Road in East Cowes is a carving and bronze plaque commemorating one of House’s most famous exploits.
House, who died aged 90 in 1930, was living in East Cowes more than a century ago. It was there he became one of the first people in the country to be convicted for speeding when, in 1899, he was behind the wheel of his LiFu (Liquid Fuel) steam wagonette.
Police using stop watches and standing at either end of a measured road clocked him doing 18mph, a full eight miles an hour over the accepted safe speed.
He ended up being prosecuted for 'furious driving’ by Island magistrates and was fined £3, with 11 shillings costs.
However, it was not the first time his passion for speed had got him into trouble. In 1891, he was fined 10 shillings after a witness reported him notching up 26 knots in a kerosene-fuelled boat he was testing on the River Thames.
The case resulted in some free advertising for House’s designs and his East Cowes business, the Liquid Fuel Engineering Company, and he went on to build craft for royal families across Europe, including the Prince of Wales.
House was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1840 and was the youngest son of Ezekiel House, an architect and builder.
In 1852, the family moved to Owego in New York where they lived by the Susquehanna River. Showing his flair for inventing at an early age, House and his brother, James, built a boat.
When the American Civil War broke out, Henry was rejected as a volunteer because of an earlier injury, which had crippled his right hand and turned his attention to making a button hole machine.
It was tested on army overcoats and caps and was the subject of four patents. House also invented a special sewing machine patent, which went on to become an industry standard throughout the world.
In the spring of 1866, Henry and James turned their attention to their first steam driven 'horseless carriage.’ It could carry seven passengers, including the driver and the fireman on the back seat, and could travel an astonishing 30mph on a good level road but it frightened so many horses and even men that the pair did not use it for long.
House’s other inventions included a bundling machine for kindling wood and a device capable of folding paper bags. This was developed and refined into a machine that could make paper plates. It was capable of making 20,000 paper dishes in ten hours and House also invented a superheated steam system to speed up the plate-making process.
Later in 1878, in collaboration with milliner, Dwight Wheeler, he invented and patented a machine for making felt hats. He also designed and made seamless paper boxes, developed a technique for metal polishing and developed an 'electric phonetic telegraph sender’ or early telephone system in 1866, years before the Alexander Graham Bell patents were issued.
Following a catastrophic fire in March 1889, which partially destroyed his factory, House accepted a contract to build a 300-horsepower flying machine at Bexley in Kent. However, after several tests, the project was abandoned.
After the 1891 court trial for speeding on the Thames, House upped sticks and moved his factory to the Island in East Cowes where he formed the Liquid Fuel Engineering Company (LiFu).
The company built high-speed launches for the Prince of Wales, the German Emperor, the King of Belgium and the Duke of St Albans, and many other famous people.
His unique system used high pressure copper tubular boilers burning kerosene oil and specially designed propellers.
After a brief period in the United States, House returned to the Island in the spring of 1896 with further patents and had a high-speed 40ft launch built, which was later exported to the United States.
He also worked on horseless vehicles on the Island between 1898 and 1904 and patented many devices that were used on early vehicles, demonstrating some of them on his wagonette which would gain him the dubious accord of being the first person to be convicted of speeding on the Island.
In 1915, aged 74, House became associated with the Shredded Wheat Company at Niagara Falls and constructed an entirely new system for baking, handling and packing Shredded Wheat biscuits.
Several years later, the Shredded Wheat Company erected a new factory to house the new automatic oven which House had designed as part of the manufacturing process. It made an astonishing 456,000 biscuits every 24 hours.
In all, House estimated he had obtained over 300 patents, including those taken out in foreign countries. But when asked what his proudest achievement was, it was not the telephone, the car, the steam launch or the button machine but the humble Shredded Wheat maker.