America's Genius for Invention - first steamboat

Riddick

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Part I: Pathfinders to a New Civilization

John Fitch - first steamboat

The story of the steamboat properly begins with John Fitch, not yet 40, striding the dense wilderness forests of the Ohio Valley in 1781-82.
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He [Fitch] would have got nowhere without the happy circumstance that he had a drinking partner, a hearty German-born clockmaker by the name of Henry Voight, who, like Fitch, was a religious radical, a Christian Deist dismissive of the divinity of Jesus. Voight was eager to let God guide his hand in inventing an engine and offered to extend the drinking partnership into professional waters.
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They Made America, Harold Evans, pp. 21,23, 2004.

"Terrific and inspiring stories about the dreamers and doers who dared to create the modern face of this great nation." - Jack Welch
 
Didn't we go through a series of these posts from Riddick some time ago?

Anyway, I second GM: just what is your point, Riddick? It's been a while so my memory may be off here, but I don't recall getting a satisfactory answer from you last time.
 
He's obviously trying to suggest something by pointing out Fitch's history. Booze leads to innovation.
 
UserGoogol said:
He's obviously trying to suggest something by pointing out Fitch's history. Booze leads to innovation.
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That there's no idea a drunken American cannot steal from the British or the French?

Originally posted by Wikipedia
In 1736 Jonathan Hulls took out a patent in England for a Newcomen engine powered steamboat, but it was the improvement in steam engines by James Watt that made the concept feasible. William Henry of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, having found out about Watt's engine on a visit to England, made his own engine and in 1763 tried putting it in a boat. The boat sank, and while he made an improved model he does not seem to have had much success, though he may have inspired others.

In France, the Marquis Claude de Jouffroy and colleagues made a working steamboat by 1774 that was too slow for river use. In 1783 a new paddle steamer, the Pyroscaphe successfully steamed up the river Saône for fifteen minutes before the engine failed, but bureaucracy thwarted further progress.
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I *get* it now. Riddick is trying to teach us that sometimes people invent marvelous things when inspired by their creator (and booze). As a secondary lesson, bears $#!+ in the woods, and moss grows on the north side of trees. Yay! I'm convinced. Religious people invent things sometimes. He has offered up the right kind of verifiable evidence and stated his case in a way in which only he can. Riddick wins this round, folks.

:D
 
Yep, the lying git is back, and he's as moronic and short on information as ever. :(
 
The GM said:
I *get* it now. Riddick is trying to teach us that sometimes people invent marvelous things when inspired by their creator (and booze).
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Well, I'm convinced! I'm going to go out to get massively drunk right now, even though it's not even the afternoon. Then I'll do again and again, fostering a tendancy for alcoholism. In a few months, after I've destroyed my life, I'll turn to God to save me from my weakness. Naturally, this ploy will fail. But it will give me a good guilt complex that I've had a hankering for.

With the unbeatable combination of booze 'n' the Lord, I'll unleash my hidden genius on the world and invent...the next stage in steamboat engineering! Bwa ha ha!
 
Brahe said:


With the unbeatable combination of booze 'n' the Lord, I'll unleash my hidden genius on the world and invent...the next stage in steamboat engineering! Bwa ha ha!
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You, sir, are a great American.
 
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