Thinking Like Telford
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Bridge Innovation -- The Menai Suspension Bridge

From the Afterword to “Thinking Like Telford”: Where to From Here?

Where can we take this "Thinking Like Telford" metaphor shown on the cover of this booklet? [Scots of Scarborough, V1#2] What discoveries can we guide students toward? What innovations can we inspire students to imagine? The list of "STEAM'D" learning activities in this booklet is wide-ranging and a meaningful starting point. Not only was Thomas Telford a profoundly skilled engineer (the E in STEAM'D) but, he was also on the leading edge of developing our understanding of materials science (S), at least from a behaviour point of view. Telford was also a poet -- the A in STEAM'D.

But perhaps most importantly -- the D for diversity in STEAM'D -- Telford was not from the nobility or upper classes about whom and by whom much of our history has been written. Telford grew up poor and is a model for self-improvement, work ethic and initiative. Our histories -- the stories of our evolution as a civilization -- should look much more closely at our ordinary citizens. We can learn a lot from the stories like these in The Scots of Scarborough. It is a thrill indeed to learn that the original catch-ment area for our school, SATEC @W.A. Porter CI, includes some of the farm that was operated by a co-founder of the milk marketing movement in Ontario. He was just an ordinary farmer, or so we would have thought until now.

By George Mavraganis, Principal, SATEC @W.A. Porter CI (2016), Toronto District School Board

Personal Inspiration: Perspective of a Teacher / P. Eng., 2016

One of the greatest civil engineers of all time, Thomas Telford, was born and raised very poor and very disadvantaged in southern Scotland. Telford is an excellent case study in self-improvement. He trained his mind (and constantly practiced!) to look at things differently in order to successfully implement solutions that profoundly modernized Britain’s infrastructure. Today’s students can learn to “Think Like Telford” as they grow their Lifelong Learning and Thinking skills.
            D. Bruce McCowan, P.Eng, OCT, Former Chair, Professional Engineers Ontario Education Committee, 2010-2012

Overview

2016 is Scotland’s Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design. Volume 1 Number 2 of “The Scots of Scarborough” is all about thinking for innovation and problem-solving – the kind of thinking that lead to the world’s first (arguably) modern suspension bridge – Thomas Telford’s Menai Bridge. This new kind of bridge did not come in some flash of genius. Nor was it as simple as rope = swinging foot-bridge = heavy traffic suspension bridge. Though not a Scarborough Scot, Thomas Telford grew up with some of them, apprenticed as a stonemason alongside them and, little doubt, shared his dreams with them.

This kind of innovative outside-the-box thinking began when ordinary Scots sought to improve their lot in life by farming differently than those before them. In 1613, John McCowan raised perhaps five times more sheep on Chang and Whitehill farms in Old Cumnock than did the expanded farms a century and a half later and, moreover, he paid cash wages to farm servants – ahead of his time yet again. To maximize their rents, landlords in the Scottish lowlands generally started consolidating farms (and removing families) in the mid-1700s.  But Robert McCowan in 1702, William McCowan in 1713, David McCowan in 1728 and Hew McCowan in 1742 all held leases on two or more adjacent farms in Old Cumnock – well ahead of the landlord’s farm consolidations. We can bet that some -- perhaps many -- aspects of agricultural improvement began, not with the landlord, but with his progressive tenants such as these McCowan farmers in Old Cumnock Parish.

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