George Henry Corliss

American mechanical engineer and inventor, born in 1817 in Easton, New York, and died in 1888 in Providence, Rhode Island. He developed the Corliss steam engine, a stationary steam engine design using variable cutoff valve gear to control precisely when steam entered the cylinder, giving far greater fuel efficiency than earlier steam engines. His engine gave factories a reliable, powerful source of mechanical power and let manufacturing expand beyond sites tied to water power. Corliss founded the Corliss Steam Engine Company in Providence in 1856, which grew to employ over a thousand workers across roughly five acres of works. His best known creation was the Centennial Engine, a 1400 horsepower machine that powered the Machinery Hall at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, built at his own expense of about 100,000 dollars. His valve gear design won first prize at the 1867 Paris World's Fair against a hundred competing engine builders, and he received the Rumford Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1870 and the Montyon Prize from the Institute of France in 1879.