W. Albert Hickman

William Albert Hickman (22 December 1878, New Brunswick – 10 September 1957) was a Canadian designer and manufacturer of innovative fast boats. He is best known as the inventor of the Hickman Sea Sled.

Born in Dorchester, New Brunswick, Hickman grew up in Pictou, Nova Scotia, as part of a wealthy shipbuilding family. He earned a degree in marine engineering from Harvard University in 1899. He was later a Commissioner of New Brunswick, a lecturer for the Government, a Fellow of the Royal Colonial Institute and a successful novelist.^[1]

He was highly intelligent but, openly, did not suffer fools gladly and was forever irritating his contemporaries in the marine business. This probably contributed to the low coverage of his ideas in the boating press.^[2]

A 1940's promotional brochure which was in other respects conventional sales material included this banner heading which revealed the man: "Truth is like unto a star, appearing somewhat small, but bright and secure".^[2]

Hickman sea sled

He was the inventor of the inverted vee planing hull known as the Hickman sea sled

A new type of vessel, which promises to revolutionize water craft and which takes the same place on the water that the automobile does on land - Scientific American 26 September 1914

Along with the Sea Sled, a direct forefather of the modern high speed catamaran, or tunnel hull, he is credited with producing the first surface propellers, working out that they produced lift and patenting ideas for lifting strakes, sponsons, anti-trip chines and prop-riding craft. These are all well known and widely used principles today.^[3]

Selected works

Like the story-telling narrator of An Unofficial Love-Story, who admits at the beginning of his fiction, "I was but an onlooker on the far outside," Albert Hickman became a kind of literary bystander, observing literature from a distance and Canadian literature, in particular, from an American vantage point. But his fiction continues to stand, albeit in a small corner in need of more light.^[4]

This is an incomplete list that may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding it with reliably sourced entries.

• 1900 – Handbook of New Brunswick
• 1903 – The Canadian West and Northwest
• 1903 – The Sacrifice of the Shannon 2003 ISBN 978-0-88780-542-4
• 1909 – An Unofficial Love Story
• 1914 – Canadian Nights

See also

• Supercavitation propeller

Notes

References

• Campbell, Lorne. Innovation in Small Craft Design - A Tribute. The Royal Institute of Naval Architects Web Site.
• Gerr, Dave. "The Hickman Sea Sled: The Best High Speed Hull Ever? (article)" Boatbuilder Magazine Sept/Oct 1998.
• Gerr, Dave. "Sea Sled Slides Again (article)." Boatbuilder Magazine Jan/Feb 2003
• Hall, Charles H. "Manufacturing Sea Sleds (article)." Motor Boat. 10 Nov 1926
• Nelson, Curtis L. Hunters in the Shallows: A History of the PT Boat. 2003 ISBN 978-1-57488-601-6
• St. Pierre, Paul Matthew. (2006). "William Albert Hickman" in Dictionary of Literary Biography. Detroit, Michigan: Thomson Gale.
• Seidman, David. Damned by Faint Praise (article)." 100th issue of Wooden Boat, May/June 1991.

External links

• Miss Lakeside - Genius Comes Home to Roost, a 1925 Hickman Sea Sled]
• The sea sledge