Profile of A.E. Kennelly
A.E. Kennelly Portrait
Among the several electrical engineers who have rapidly risen to prominence within recent years, Mr. A. E. Kennelly, whose portrait appears in this number, occupies a conspicuous position.
Mr. Kennelly was born in Bombay, India, in 1861, and it is from his father, at that time commander of a frigate in the East India navy, that he has inherited, in large- part, his mathematical ability. He left India at an early age for the purpose of receiving an education in Europe, and finally entered the University College School, London. While at this institution, in 1875, his attention was turned to electricity, and on leaving the school in 1876, he became assistant secretary at the office and Ronalds Library of the Institute of Electrical Engineers, then the Society of Telegraph Engineers.
As a result of his studies at the Ronalds Library, he was enabled to enter the service of the Eastern Telegraph Company in 1877, and thence onward promotion was rapid. In 1880 he became assistant electrician on board the steamship John Pender, and in 1881 became chief electrician on board the same vessel. Later he served in the same capacity on several other vessels in the company’s service, and was employed in work over all parts of the Eastern Telegraph Company’s submarine cable system. It was during this period that he discovered the law of fault resistance known by his name, and which is now so much employed in cable testing, and in 1887 he published a paper on the subject which received the “Society’s Premium” for that year.
In 1888, while senior electrician afloat of the Eastern Telegraph Company, he resigned his position to accept that of electrician to Edison, then just commencing work in his new laboratory at Orange, N. J. , and was shortly afterward appointed consulting electrician to the Edison General Electric Company and later to the General Electric Company. Within the past year he left Edison’s laboratory to enter upon electrical engineering work at Philadelphia with Prof. Houston, under the firm name of Houston & Kennelly.
Mr. Kennelly is a vice-president of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, and is also a member of the New York Mathematical Society, of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, an associate member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers of London, and a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. His work has covered a wide field, though, because of his connection with the Edison company, necessarily but a small portion of his researches in electrical engineering has been published. Through the courtesy of that company, however, the results of his experiments on the heating of electrical conductors have been made available, and upon these almost all the tables at present in use have been based.
Among the more important instruments designed by him may be mentioned the differential dynamometer wattmeter — an instrument by which, the primary of a transformer being suitably connected to one set of coils, and the secondary to the other set, the losses in the transformer at any load may be read directly from the instrument; a static voltmeter now in use in street railway stations, which overcomes some of the difficulties met with in other forms of the instrument, and the ammeter bearing his name.
Besides having contributed a goodly share to the transactions of the several scientific societies with which he is connected, Mr. Kennelly is also the author of two books, one entitled ” Practical Notes for Electrical Students,” and a later one on “The Theoretical Elements of Electro-Dynamic Machinery.”