Adam Beck

Politician

• Born: June 20, 1857
• Birthplace: Baden, Province of Canada (now Ontario)
• Died: August 15, 1925
• Place of death: London, Ontario

Contribution: Adam Beck was a Canadian manufacturer, engineer, and politician. Known as the “hydro knight,” he is remembered for his work promoting the public ownership of electric power companies, particularly the water-powered Niagara Falls generator. Beck firmly believed that everyone should be able to afford electricity, especially electricity generated from nature. The Sir Adam Beck Hydroelectric Generating Stations at Niagara Falls, Ontario, are named in his honor.

Early Life and Education

Adam Beck was born on June 20, 1857, in the village of Baden, Province of Canada (now Ontario). He was the third of six children born to Jacob and Charlotte Beck. He had no formal training in engineering, but he came from a line of men with mechanical and engineering abilities who had long applied their gifts to using the power of moving water; his father’s family, in fact, had been millers for generations, using water wheels to grind grain. His father started a foundry and used a water wheel to provide its power. He also used the water wheel to provide power to his grist mill. Like his forebears, Beck had an extraordinary aptitude for mechanical engineering, which he would later apply toward electrical and civil engineering.

Beck attended William Tassie’s boarding school in Galt and later attended Rockwell Academy near Guelph. Despite his obvious energy and intelligence, he found it difficult to concentrate and was a poor student. When he was not in school, he worked in his father’s foundry as a molder and machine shop apprentice.

Early Career and Family

When Beck was twenty-two, he moved to Toronto, where he worked as a clerk in a brass factory and later in a cigar factory. Soon after, Beck, his brother William, and their cousin William Hespeler founded their own cigar box manufacturing company. The company was so successful that they opened facilities in Montreal, Toronto, and London, Ontario. Beck moved to London, and at the age of forty-one, he married the much younger Lillian Ottaway; they would eventually have one daughter, Marion.

Political Career

Beck ran for election as a Conservative representative to the provincial government in 1898 but was unsuccessful. However, he did win election as mayor of London in 1902. As mayor, he implemented his values of helping society as a whole. For example, he worked to assist poor patients at Victoria Hospital, and when a private company asked him to continue their lease of the London and Port Stanley Railway, he refused; he believed that railways and utilities should be owned by the public, not by private companies. Another project he implemented provided clean water to the citizens of London. Beck said he would drill artesian wells within the city limits that would provide enough clean water for everyone. The city accepted his offer, and he paid for excess costs out of his own pocket.

In addition to serving as London’s mayor for three terms, Beck won election to the provincial government as a Conservative representative and retained his seat until a defeat in 1919. He was reelected in 1923. As mayor and representative, he worked to assist the economic growth of Ontario by implementing his desire to help average citizens.

Hydroelectric Power

Beck’s largest and longest-lasting contribution to the growth of his region began with his championing of the idea that Ontario communities should receive power at cost from the massive hydroelectric generator at Niagara Falls. Beck supervised the building of the generating station, now named after him, as well as the twelve-mile canal that diverted water from the Welland River to the station. In the station, the powerful water moving over the falls was used to turn the turbine blades. These blades held powerful magnets inside gigantic coils of wire. The rotation of the blades created an electric current. It was, and is, a clean, renewable source of energy that would always be available as long as water continued to flow over the falls.

This generator became the world’s first publicly owned utility and for many years was the largest power station in the world. In order to provide access to the electricity for the people of Ontario, a 110,000-volt transmission line was built connecting the generator at the falls to Toronto and many other Ontario towns. On October 11, 1910, Beck personally pressed the switch to turn on the electricity to the region.

In 1912, after his daughter recovered from a bout of tuberculosis, Beck created the London Health Association, which built a sanatorium for tuberculosis patients and pressured the government to improve treatment facilities for them. Although his own daughter had recovered from the disease, he knew that many poor families could not afford good treatment for their loved ones. For the rest of his life, Beck continued to oversee the sanatorium. As a result of his efforts to control and treat the disease, he was elected president of the Canadian Association for the Prevention of Tuberculosis, and the sanatorium was eventually named after him.

In 1914, Beck was formally recognized for his services to Ontario and was knighted by King George V. In 1916, the University of Western Ontario granted Beck an honorary doctorate in appreciation for his work of moving the government toward recognizing the school as a degree-granting institution.

Beck died on August 15, 1925. To mark his death, Ontario’s electricity was briefly turned off and businesses in Ontario closed for an hour. His funeral service was broadcast over the radio. In the 1950s, the power station that resulted from Beck’s vision was named after him. A statue of Beck still stands at the corner of University Avenue and Queen Street in Toronto.

Bibliography

Berton, Pierre. Niagara: A History of the Falls. Albany: State U of New York P, 2009. Print.

Froschauer, Karl. White Gold: Hydroelectric Power in Canada. Vancouver: UBC P, 2011. Print.

Morris, J. V. “Sir Adam Beck.” Contributions to Professional Engineering. Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario, 2009. Web. 26 July 2013.

Nelles, H. V. “Beck, Sir Adam.” Dictionary of Canadian Biography. U of Toronto/U Laval, 2013. Web. 26 July 2013.

Ross, J. Andrew, and Andrew D. Smith. Canada’s Entrepreneurs: From the Fur Trade to the 1929 Stock Market Crash. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 2011. Print.