REDTENBACHER, Ferdinand Jakob

R. was born as the son of an ironmonger, brother and cousin of chemist Joseph R. and zoologist Ludwig R. and deriving from an art house with a long tradition of industrial scythe manufacturing, to which Joseph Mayerhofer and Franz Schubert were also connected.
Between 1820 and 1824 he went through an apprenticeship in commerce and accounting in his uncles’ shop with food and equipment for mowing. In 1824/25 he finished technical illustrations for the construction in the building authority in Linz, while he was privately educated in mathematics. He attended the Polytechnic Institute in Vienna from 1825 until 1829 and at the same time he studied at the University under Andreas Von Ettingshausen and Joseph Johann von Littrow. He stayed at the Polytechnic Institute until 1833 as an assistant to Johann Arzberger. In 1835 he accepted an invitation to become professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, where he taught mathematics and geometry. A close relationship with Johann Kaspar Escher and Escher-Wyss hardware factory technicians gave him the boost to support until then only empirically grounded engineering theory with the mathematical methods. Due to that, he is considered the founder of science-based mechanical engineering. His drawings from the period spent in Zurich documented a tendency to systematics and excellent drafting, which was also a characteristic of his lively and always attractive lectures. Drawing and landscape painting were ultimately his favourite leisure activities. In 1841 he at last became professor of mechanics and mechanical engineering at the University of Karlsruhe, while he was its director between 1857 and 1862. The university is inextricably linked to the further development of his activities. All the basic publications that were relevant to the development of mechanical engineering and which included not only drive machinery but also the general principles of structural engineering were formed in Karlsruhe. His lectures were not only marked with his beautiful drawings on the blackboard but also with the drawings for students. In his lectures R. described even the most modern methods of industrial production for all industries, including conveyor belt principles. He gathered a collection of motion mechanisms for his courses from the field of mechanics. According to the drawings for this collection and to R.’s "Laws of locomotives construction“, his assistants, who worked in Esslingen, established the machinery and locomotives factory.
Among his students outstanding people such as mechanical engineering professor Franz Reuleaux, locomotives manufacturer Oscar Henschel, a son of a printing machine inventor Friedrich Koenig, automotive pioneer Karl Benz, a designer of a gas powered engine Eugen Langen, manufacturer Heinrich Sulzer-Steiner and his brother Albert from Winterthur, a founder of the Augsburg-Nürnberg AG. (MAN) hardware factory, Heinrich von Buz, mining industrialist August Thyssen, R.'s cousin – a sewing machine manufacturer Max Gritzner, his assistant Fred Wolf, who founded the factory in the USA for Linde refrigeration machines, as well as important techniques Joseph Trick and Karl Kley can be found.