William Albert Hickman
William Albert Hickman was a Canadian marine engineer and inventor, born on December 22, 1877, in New Brunswick. He pursued his education at Pictou Academy and later studied marine engineering at Harvard University, graduating in 1899. Initially working as an immigration commissioner in London, he aimed to attract settlers to New Brunswick through presentations and literature, which led to the publication of his first book, the "Handbook of New Brunswick." Hickman’s career was marked by his deep connection to the sea, which became evident when he served as an engineer on the ferry Minto during a challenging winter operation in 1903. He is best known for inventing the Hickman Sea Sled, a motorboat that gained military interest during World War I. Despite holding several patents and achieving wealth, Hickman struggled with business management, resulting in financial difficulties later in life. He also ventured into literature, writing a novel based on his maritime experiences, along with other fictional works that explored social themes. Hickman passed away on September 10, 1957, leaving behind a complex legacy in both engineering and Canadian literature.
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William Albert Hickman
Inventor
- Born: December 22, 1877
- Birthplace: Dorchester Parish, Westmorland, New Brunswick, Canada
- Died: September 10, 1957
Biography
William Albert Hickman was born on December 22, 1877, in Dorchester Parish, Westmorland, New Brunswick, Canada, the son of Albert J. H. Hickman and Helen (née Wilson) Hickman. He attended Pictou Academy in the province of Nova Scotia, where his family had moved, and went on to study marine engineering at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1896, earning a bachelor of science (B.S.) degree in 1899.
After graduation, Hickman (who never used the name William) worked as an immigration commissioner in London, England, for the provincial government of New Brunswick. Like other parts of Canada, New Brunswick was anxious to swell its population with settlers, and Hickman worked to attract them with slide shows and illustrated literature. It was in this position that he wrote his first book, the 248-page Handbook of New Brunswick. Afterward, Hickman became interested in the western regions of Canada, producing an extensive study that he presented to the Royal Colonial Institute in London on January 13, 1903. It was subsequently published in the Institute’s Proceedings as “The Canadian West and Northwest.”
Hickman had been born into a family of shipbuilders, and the sea figures in most of his later accomplishments. In the severe winter of 1903, he was serving as an engineer aboard the ferry Minto as it carried coal to another ship, the Stanley, which had been icebound twenty-seven days in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. When the Minto’s propeller shattered, it too became stuck, and both ships had to be freed from the ice with dynamite. An avid inventor, Hickman later designed a revolutionary motorboat and set up the Viper Company to build models commercially. The eventual result was the Hickman Sea Sled, a small, swift craft that the United States Navy purchased in quantity. As a result, Hickman became rich during World War I, turning to producing racing boats afterward. Hickman held a number of important patents, but he was less gifted as a businessman than as an inventor, and saw his fortune slip away by the time of his death on September 10, 1957.
Hickman published only five works in fifteen years. Following his surveys of New Brunswick and western Canada, he produced a popular novel of the sea, The Sacrifice of the Shannon, based on the episode of the Stanley and the Minto and actually begun aboard the latter during its mission of mercy. His remaining works—the novella An Unofficial Love-Story and the collection Canadian Nights—are also fiction, but turn from adventure to light, adeptly handled social comedy. Hickman is noted as contributing to a growing sense of self-awareness in Canadian life and literature, but the brevity of his career limited his impact. After 1914, he devoted himself to designing and building boats.