1851 Great Exhibition: Official Catalogue: Class VIII.: William Wolfe Bonney
From Graces Guide
49. BONNEY, WILLIAM WOLFE, Claremont Villa, St. John's, Fulham — Inventor and Proprietor.
New life-boat, with numerous cells, composed of gutta percha, of peculiar forms, together with gutta, percha life-buoys. It is not easily capsized, and when turned bodily over, rights itself immediately. It rows or sails equally well both ways, and steers with oars or rudders.
A life-boat, 30 feet long, 8 feet beam, 3 feet deep, built upon this principle, is said to be capable of saving 300 persons, and to be perfectly manageable when full of water and persons. A boat of gutta percha has lately been employed in the Arctic Seas with advantage.
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