Roger Hurst Willis (1872-1921)
1919 Crompton and Co. [1]
1922 Obituary [2]
ROGER HURST WILLIS was born in 1872 and died at Manchester on the 17th September, 1921. He was the eldest son of the late Reverend Thomas Willis of Manchester.
Educated at Manchester Grammar School and Manchester Technical School, he showed, early in his career, a marked leaning towards engineering and, on leaving school, entered the works of Messrs. Mather and Platt as an apprentice. Subsequently he held the position of outside manager for some 10 years.
While with this firm he was associated with the late Dr. Edward Hopkinson on many of the earliest electrical schemes, among which were the Snaefell and Laxey Railway and the Blackpool and Fleetwood Tramways, on the construction and equipment of both of which he was resident engineer.
In 1905 he accepted the position of general manager to the British Electric Plant Company, at Alloa, a position which he retained until 1914, when he returned to Manchester, where he specialized in engineering requirements for textile mills and collieries.
In 1919 he joined the firm of Messrs. Crompton and Co., Limited, as engineer and manager of their Manchester office.
He was connected with the Association of Mining Electrical Engineers from its inception, representing the East of Scotland Branch (of which he was Honorary Secretary) on the General Council in 1910. Transferring later to the West of Scotland Branch, he again became Member of Council and was afterwards elected to the Advisory Committee (of three) which had virtually the executive control of the Association's interests.
In 1914 he became Honorary Secretary and Treasurer of the Lancashire, Cheshire and North Staffordshire Branch of the Association, of which he became President-elect in 1921. It was chiefly owing to his untiring efforts that the Association began to publish its Transactions in a technical journal of its own.
He was elected an Associate Member of the Institution of Electrical Engineers in 1900, and a Member in 1908.