Electrical Papers

New York & London: Macmillan & Co, 1894. SECOND EDITION. Text illustrations. Original publisher’s cloth, an exceptionally good copy. Ownership signature of the writer and electrical engineer F[ranz] J[osphe] Dommerque. Scarce second edition of Heaviside’s collected works in all aspects of electricity, practical and theoretical. First printed two years earlier, many of the papers had originally appeared in the Philosophical Magazine and The Electrician. He deals with “theoretical aspects of problems in telegraphy and electrical transmission, making use of an unusual calculatory method called operational calculus, now better known as the method of Laplace transforms, to study transient currents in networks. His work on the theory of the telephone made long-distance service practical” (Encyclopedia Britannica).

Heaviside (1850-1925) was a self-taught electrical engineer, physicist and mathematician. He became “an expert in mathematical physics and played an important role in the development of the electro-magnetic theory of James Clerk Maxwell and in its practical applications” (DSB). He anticipated employment of Laplace and Fourier transforms in electrical engineering, and was the first to formulate the mathematical equations for use in telegraphy. He was elected an honorary member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers, from whom he was awarded the first Faraday Medal, as well as a Fellow of the Royal Society.