William Austin Burt (June 13, 1792 – August 18,1858) was an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
inventorAn inventor is a person who creates or discovers a new method, form, device or other useful means. The word inventor comes form the latin verb invenire, invent-, to find...
,
legislatorA legislator is a person who writes and passes laws, especially someone who is a member of a legislature. Legislators are usually politicians and are often elected by the people...
,
surveyorSurveying or land surveying is the technique and science of accurately determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional space position of points and the distances and angles between them...
, and
millwrightA millwright is a craftsman or tradesman engaged with the construction and maintenance of machinery.Early millwrights were specialist carpenters who erected machines used in agriculture, food processing and processing lumber and paper...
.
Burt was born in
Worcester, MassachusettsWorcester is a city in the state of Massachusetts in the United States of America. Having a population of 172,648 in the 2000 census, Worcester is ranked the second or third largest city in New England. It is the county seat of Worcester County....
, and lived in
MichiganMichigan is a Midwestern state of the United States of America. It was named after Lake Michigan, whose name is a French adaptation of the Ojibwe term mishigama, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
from 1822 until his death in 1858. He was a member of the Michigan Territorial Legislature, 1826-1827. He served as Mount Vernon's first
postmasterA postmaster is the head of an individual post office. Postmistress is not used anymore in the United States, as the "master" component of the word refers to a person of authority and has no gender quality...
from 1832 to 1856. He was a
Macomb CountyMacomb County is a county in the U.S. state of Michigan. The 2000 census recorded its population to be 788,149. In 2008, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that its population had reached 830,663. The county seat is Mt. Clemens...
Circuit Court judgeThe United States circuit courts were the original intermediate level courts of the United States federal court system. They were established by the Judiciary Act of 1789. They had trial court jurisdiction over civil suits of diversity jurisdiction and major federal crimes. They also had appellate...
in 1833, a state legislator in 1853, and a deputy U.S. surveyor from 1833 to 1853. While surveying, he won acclaim for his accurate work on public land surveys. In 1857, Burt moved to
DetroitDetroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the seat of Wayne County. Detroit is a major port city on the Detroit River, in the Midwest region of the United States. Located north of Windsor, Ontario, Detroit is the only major U.S. city that looks south to Canada. It was founded...
, where he died a year later.
Among Burt's numerous inventions were the typographer in 1829, which was a predecessor to the
typewriterA typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical device with a set of "keys" that, when pressed, cause characters to be printed on a medium, usually paper...
. He also invented the
solar compassThe solar compass was invented by William Austin Burt; he patented it on February 25, 1836. In the 19th century, the solar compass would be employed for surveying the land, where regular compasses were susceptible to the abundances of minerals that made for inaccurate readings...
, a surveying tool used in the Michigan Survey, employed in regions that had an abundance of minerals, which would interfere with accurate readings when using ordinary instruments. While out surveying on September 19, 1844, in what is today
Marquette County, MichiganMarquette County is a county in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2000 census, the population was 64,634. The county seat is Marquette. Marquette County is the largest county in land area in Michigan, and the most populous county in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.-Geography:The Huron...
, Burt discovered one of the largest
iron oreThe Marquette Iron Range is a deposit of iron ore located in Marquette County, Michigan, largely in and around the towns of Ishpeming and Negaunee. It is a smaller counterpart of Minnesota's Mesabi Range. The iron ore of the Marquette Range has been mined continuously from 1847 until the present...
deposits in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. A historical plaque commemorates William Austin Burt at
Stony CreekStony Creek park is a park in Michigan. Huron-Clinton Metropark located predominantly in Washington Township, MI and Oakland Charter Township, MI, with a small portion in Shelby Township, MI. The park covers with a large lake at its center.-Geography:...
, near his home in Mt. Vernon, Michigan.
External links
- http://www.geo.msu.edu/geo333/burt.htmL from Michigan State University.