Thomas Telford
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Reissued by The History Press, 2010
Re-issued by Sutton Publishing, 2007
Originally published by Methuen in 1967
Thomas Telford was a bridge-builder extraordinary. The son of a shepherd from the Scottish borders, Telford rose to be one of the greatest engineers Britain has ever seen. His bridges, aqueducts, roads and canals combined aesthetic grace with brilliant engineering. His life spanned one of the most dynamic periods in British history, the Industrial Revolution, and no one contributed more to making Britain the 'workshop of the world'.
"A most readable and enjoyable book, for Mr Rolt manages to bring and keep Telford alive...a feat which has hitherto defeated his biographers."
The Listener
"Mr Rolt realizes from the start that what makes Telford important is what he did, not what he was ... an original writer on fresh themes, he knows his subject matter inside out."
The Times Literary Supplement
In his foreword to the 2007 edition, published to coincide with the 250th anniversary of Telford's birth, Sir Neil Cossons pays tribute to Rolt:
"Through his writing, as the first president of the Association for Industrial Archaeology, his membership of the Science Museum’s Advisory Committee and as chairman of the Council for British Archaeology Research committee, his deep knowledge and wise counsel helped create the climate in which as a nation, we can now recognise and value the great age of industry."
