I’ve just been writing about George Smart (1758-1834). Smart was perhaps most famous for his “scandiscope” in 1803, an invention for cleaning chimneys. What I find most fascinating about this case, however, was the fact that it was an invention purposefully and popularly designed to cause unemployment (see the illustrated ditty, below). Indeed, it had a popular campaign behind it, in the form of the grandly titled Society for Superseding the Necessity of Climbing Boys in Cleaning Chimneys. 

The scandiscope was essentially a series of equally sized and numbered hollow wooden rods, of 2.5 feet (76cm), that all slotted together, with a cord passing through the middle. Thus, the person sweeping the chimney could slowly assemble it while pushing it up the chimney shaft, and it would retain its stiffness. Once it reached the top, the cord was pulled, opening the brushes to fill the chimney and brush against its walls. It could then be pulled down, bringing the soot down with it, while the fireplace was covered with an adjustable cloth to prevent the room from filling with soot (see below, for some helpful illustrations).

Originally a Camden timber merchant and carpenter, Smart soon had his own business manufacturing the scandiscope, as well as a team of six men and horses travelling around London cleaning chimneys with it. In 1805, he won the gold medal from the Society of Arts for the greatest number of chimnies cleaned by mechanical means - a prize originally advertised as part of the concerted effort to reduce such dangerous child labour.

Interestingly, his 1805 prize application also included testimonies from almost 100 housekeepers, for whom he had cleaned 378 flues. This suggests that it was already being widely used by the time it would have gained the greatest public exposure. By the mid-19th Century the scandiscope and its improvements by inventors like Joseph Glass were being used to sweep the majority of chimneys in London. Oh, just look at that bundle of hollow tubes Bert is holding:

The scandiscope’s rapid adoption is unsurprising, as it had several advantages over the use of climbing boys. It could fit into flues that were too small even for the smallest child labourers, and, depending upon the skill of the master sweep, the scandiscope could be more effective at dislodging soot than boys. It was also less dangerous - indeed, if a wet rag was tied over the brush, it could be used to put out fires burning in the flue (the second highest cause of fire in London in the 1830s and 40s - according to p.48 of this book). If anything, it should be more of the puzzle that it wasn’t adopted even faster - more on that in a later post.

Smart was to become an innovative civil engineer later on in life, as well as inventing methods of preparing timber to prevent shrinkage, and a machine for grinding corn. However, what I like most about him is that his invention of the scandiscope demonstrates that the Industrial Revolution - the invention of invention - could be as much about reducing the need for child labour as growing the industries that used it. Many children of the later nineteenth century will have had Smart to thank for their lungs and their lives.