John Fredrick Thomas Jane
John Fredrick Thomas Jane. Naval expert and founder of Jane's Fighting Ships
John Fredrick Thomas Jane (1865-1916) was the founding editor of reference books on warships (All the World's Fighting Ships) and aircraft (All the World's Airships). He also once kidnapped Victor Grayson MP in a political stunt.
1865 August 6th. Born in Richmond, Surrey, England, but worked most of his life in Portsmouth. His father was a vicar and he attended Exeter School. He first began to sketch warships in his teens, and was notable in the 1890s for illustrating scientific romances by George Griffith and other authors, as well as for his own novels such as To Venus in Five Seconds (1897) and The Violet Flame (1899).
An avid miniatures war-gamer, Jane first published All the World's Fighting Ships (also known as Jane's Fighting Ships) in 1898, which identified the warships operated by each country, their armaments, and other details, as a supplement to a game he designed. The book, now an annual series, is a standard reference work.
In 1909, he created All the World's Aircraft. Jane later founded what is now Jane's Information Group.
Jane was also involved in politics, standing as an Independent candidate for Portsmouth in the 1906 general election. He was strongly opposed to the Liberal Party (especially its left wing) and when a left-wing Liberal candidate Edward Hemmerde was nominated in 1910, he arranged a stunt to disrupt their election campaign. At another public meeting, Jane arranged for a sailor to ask Hemmerde to insist on the supply of hammock ladders should he be elected: Hemmerde fell for this and gave the pledge. His Portsmouth home, on Southsea Common, now bears a plaque recording that he lived there.
In later life Jane lived at Bedhampton and was instrumental in setting up one of the very first Scout troops
1916 March 8th. Died
1916 Obituary [1]
'WE are almost tempted to include the death of our old contributor Mr. F. T. Jane amongst the naval events of the month, for there are few names connected with the navies of the world more widely known than him. He was the inventor, as every one knows, of a very remarkable and quite indispensable book - the "World's Fighting Ships." In its early day many of the illustrations were from Mr. Jane's own pen or brush, but of late years forecast views of vessels have disappeared and reproductions and photographs of existing vessels have taken the place of pictures. A quite remarkable feature of the book from the very first was the series of silhouette of warships. These carefully prepared little black sketches gave the reader just those salient facts about individual ships that he would see if the vessels were many miles distant from him. They were intended to help the observer in identifying vessels at sea. Mr. Jane was also the inventor of a naval war game that very nearly reproduced the conditions of actual warfare. As far as manoeuvring was concerned it was almost perfect. It was played with little model ships on a large table divided into squares, each square representing a fraction of a sea mile. The relative speed of ships could thus be closely approximated. The gun fire and torpedo attack was carried out by striking with a point at paper targets, which were of different sizes and forms to represent the distance and aspect of the vessel attacked. Mr. Jane held that they gave approximately accurate results, and when the game was played under his guidance his intimate knowledge of all ships enabled him to estimate closely the value of a hit. Besides these two principal works with which Mr. Jane's name will always be connected, we must recall that he wrote many articles, a few novels, and several books, of which, perhaps, the best is "The British Battle Fleet," a volume which might be more widely read with advantage in these days. Of his work for THE ENGINEER we need not here speak ; it consisted partly of characteristic drawings and partly of articles and notes that were equally characteristic. Mr. Jane was still a fairly young man, only forty-six, and although he was never robust his death occurred rather suddenly. He undoubtedly influenced thought to a certain extent and encouraged a healthy and helpful interest in naval affairs. It will indeed be difficult to fill the particular place he had made for himself in the world.'
See Also
Sources of Information
- ↑ The Engineer 1916/04/07