William Reid Clanny
Dr William Reid Clanny (1776-1850) was an Irish physician and inventor of a safety lamp
Born in Bangor, County Down, Kingdom of Ireland.
He trained as a physician at Edinburgh, and served as an assistant surgeon in the Royal Navy.
He left the Navy and graduated in 1803 before settling for a while in Durham.
He moved to Bishopwearmouth, in Sunderland, England and practised there for 45 years.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1825, his proposers being Sir George Ballingall, Robert Kaye Greville, and Sir William Newbigging.
1812 The mine disaster at Felling Colliery and later in the year the explosion at Mill Pit in Herrington near Sunderland concentrated minds on the problems of underground lighting.
In the same year Clanny completed his first lamp consisting of a candle in a glass surround. Below the glass was a trough containing water through which air was forced by a pair of bellows. Fumes bubbled out through another water chamber above.
1850 January 10th. Died and was buried at Galleys Gill Cemetery in Sunderland. The entry in the Dictionary of National Biography states "his claim to remembrance rests on his efforts to diminish the loss of life from explosions in collieries.