User:JeremyA/sandbox/John Curr

John Curr (c. 1756 – 27 January 1823) was the manager of the Duke of Norfolk's collieries in Sheffield, England from 1781 to 1801. During this time he made a number of innovations that contributed significantly to the development of the coal mining industry and railways.

Personal life
Curr was born in County Durham, England in around 1756. He moved to Sheffield some time before 1776. In 1780 he was appointed superintendent of the Duke of Norfolk's Sheffield collieries. He married Hannah Wilson (18 May 1759 – 10 June 1851) in about 1785, and they had at least eight children. He died in Sheffield on 27 January 1823.

Career
In about 1776 Curr substituted small four-wheeled carriages for the sledges that had previously been used to transport coal underground, the first use of such carriages in vertical pits. On 12 August 1788 he received a patent (No. 1,660) for a method of lifting these carriages out of the mine using wooden guide rails. Curr then developed the rails on which the carriages ran. Previously wooden rails had been used, with plates of iron attached to the top surface of the rail and flanges on the wheel of the carriage; Curr developed an L-shaped cast iron rail that removed the need for flanges on the carriage wheels. The use of these rails was subsequently promoted by Benjamin Outram and adopted at many other English mines.

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