Talk:Louis Gathmann

Researcher
J. Gathmann is a researcher of Louis Gathmann, and is the Gath-Past website webmaster. He can be contacted at — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mav (talk • contribs)

The Baltimore Museum of Industry may be of interest to those interested in his son Emil Gathmann. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ShelbyDodgeImp (talk • contribs) }

"...his death was mentioned in papers all over the globe, from the Chicago Tribune, to the New York Times and the Washington Post." That's a strange definition of "all over the globe". -- User:Rst

Big Bertha and Japanese Naval Ordnance
I have edited the claims concerning Gathmann's invention of both the German Big Bertha howitzer and the Japanese naval guns used at Tsushima as neither claim has any basis in fact. Both were media inventions. McTodd (talk) 09:09, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Bias claim biased?
The claim that the gov't decided not to use his gun because of some ideological bias is also questionable. There's very little written about Gathmann after the 1900s, but contemporary press speaks of test failure. "The Gathmann wet gun cotton shell was a failure, as was also the Isham shell, as it provided only for an outside explosion." "The test of the Gathmann torpedo gun under the requirement of the fortifications act of March 1, 1901, resulted in an unfavorable report, in which the Board of Ordnance and Fortification has concurred." "Mr. Gathmann slated that the failure was due to the gun cotton not being in intimate contact witli the fuze; butt tie character of the fragmentation of the fuze chamber showed do detonation of the primer. " The only slightly more recent account is Teddy Rosevelt's memoirs which say "in the Gathmann Gun matter, because strong political pressure was brought to bear upon me to favor the Gathmann Gun. ... had been attacked in Congress for his failure, fifteen years before, to approve the Gathmann gun". Claims of Gathmann's awesome influence on artillery developments in several countries appear very WP:FRINGE. I can't even find one artillery book after the 1900s that even mentions him. This all appears to be promotion from his descendants on a couple of tripod.com web sites, and which have apparently edited Wikipedia as well. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 16:25, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

You can read a summary of the test results in Text-book of ordnance and gunnery by United States Naval Institute, 1905 "The most striking example of this result was in the test of the 12-inch Army rifle in comparison with the 18-inch Gathmann Torpedo Gun. This test marked such an important advance in the attack on armor that the result is given in full. [...] The comparative harmlessness of the Gathmann shell loaded with  500 pounds of gun-cotton when exploded against a similar plate  was due to the fact that the shell did not penetrate but simply exploded outside and in contact with the plate." Claims that Gathmann's gun influenced naval gunnery (except as a failed experiment from which lessons were drawn) or even the "concrete busting" German siege guns, which were also based on armor piercing principles, are therefore ridiculous. No artillery book makes them. Gathmann did however have some political clout in his time, which probably extended to some part of the contemporary US press; see quote from Teddy Rosevelt's memoirs above. A case of temporary fame. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 16:54, 7 September 2011 (UTC)