Forum Auctions
Los 91
Steam Engines.- Act of Parliament. An Act for vesting in James Watt, Engineer, his Executors, Administrators, and Assigns, the sole use and Property of certain Steam Engines, commonly called Fire Engines, of his Invention..., title and 8pp., extract pp.1587-1594, by Charles Eyre and William Strachan, 1775; An Act to enable Matthew Boulton, Engineer, to export the Machinery necessary for erecting a Mint in the Dominions of His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor of all the Russias, 3pp., extract pp.753-755, 1799, disbound, preserved together in modern cloth portfolio with morocco label § Partington (C.F.) An Historic and Descriptive Account of the Steam Engine, first edition, folding engraved frontispiece, advertisement leaf and 7 folding plates at end (foxed, some loose), trace of library stamp to title, original boards, uncut, rubbed, rebacked, 1822 § Young (C.F.T.) The Economy of Steam Power on common Roads, first edition, large folding plate of Boydell's Traction Engine, errata slip, plates and illustrations, original pictorial cloth, gilt, rubbed, spine faded, preserved in modern cloth drop-back box, [1860]; and another on steam engines, folio & 8vo (5)⁂ Watt took out his first patent on a steam engine in 1769; the first act here was an extension of that patent giving him and his partner Matthew Boulton the sole right to manufacture the engine until 1800. Boulton used Watt's invention to improve the minting of coinage, for which he took out a patent in 1790. He produced the machinery at his Soho Foundry in Birmingham, the second act enabling him to export it to Russia, which would otherwise have been illegal.
