Thomas Telford, enlightenment engineer

Thomas Telford (1757-1834) was born in Westerkirk, Scotland. Son of a shepherd, he was a stonemason, architect, and civil engineer. He designed and built numerous, significant, lasting roads, bridges, and canals.

The Caledonian Canal is a massive sea-to-sea navigable waterway, connecting the Atlantic Ocean to Inverness and the North Sea. Running sixty miles through the great Glen, with more than twenty miles of canals and locks, it is one and a half times the length of the Panama Canal, and nearly two-thirds as long as the Suez (for which it was the model). Its construction is one of the great epics of modern engineering history, It took Telford almost fifteen years to build... [How The Scots Invented The Modern World, Arthur Herman, 2001; p. 282]