BELL Thomas

UNITED KINGDOM (see also List of Individuals)

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21.12.1865 Sirsawa/IN - 9.1.1952 Helensburgh/UK

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Throughout his distinguished career, Thomas Bell was associated with the Clyde shipbuilding industry and at the time of retirement he had the position of managing director of John Brown Ltd in 1935. Bell received until 1880 education from King's College, London and then entered the Royal Naval College of Devonport. In 1887 he joined the Clydebank ship building works: He became a chief draftsman soon and in 1895 was appointed outside manager and assistant to the engineering director.

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The Clydebank establishment founded in 1846 was associated from 1852 with the Cunard Company and from that time was concerned with the design and construction of many famous Cunard ships. In the 1890s the Clydebank Yard received a contract for HMS Terrible which was completed within 14 months, shedding light on the energy and enthusiasm of the undertakings then directed by Bell. In 1899 Bell was appointed manager of the ship yard with notable ships built shortly later, such as the Carmania completed in 1905, which was the first ship fitted out at Clydebank with a direct-driven turbine installation. The similar Lusitania completed in 1907 was described by Bell in the 1914 paper. In 1916 Clydebank delivered the first naval vessel fitted with geared turbines, and in 1921 completed the battle cruiser HMS Hood. Two of Clydebank's most famous ships were the Queen Mary and the Queen Elizabeth launched in the 1930s. Bell was elected to the Board of John Brown Ltd. in 1908 and became engineering director of the Clydebank ship yard in 1909. In 1917 Bell was appointed Deputy Controller of Dockyards and War Shipbuilding at the Admiralty, an office he held until the end of World War I. Sir Thomas was an Honorary Vice-president of the Institution of Naval Architects. He there was also a prominent member of the technical societies, and he was a Member of the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders, Scotland, for 65 years. Bell was a personality who might be described as "a large man": Tall in physical stature, broad in his mental outlook and strong in will-power, but above all with a "sterling character of strict integrity".

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_{Anonymous (1952). Sir Thomas Bell. The Engineer 193: 102-103. P}

_{Anonymous (1952). Sir Thomas Bell. Engineering 173: 84. P}

_{Anonymous (1952). Sir Thomas Bell, KBE. Trans. Institution Naval Architects 94: 368-369. P}

_{Anonymous (1955). Thomas Bell. Proc. Institution of Civil Engineers Part 1 4: 109.}

_{Bell, T. (1908). Speed trials and service performance of the Cunard turbine steamer "Lusitania". Trans. Institution Naval Architects 50: 96-114.}