HE WAS A MARVEL

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 4, Issue 187, 1 December 1941, Page 3

HE WAS A MARVEL

THE CALCUATING MAN

AMAZING ABILITY TO ADD

He was one of the most amazing men who have ever lived. George Parker Bidder was his name, and he was born a year after Trafalgar, and was at Stoke Fleming in Devon in 1878.

As a boy, he lived at Moreton Hampstead, on the edge of Dartmoor, and when he was about 28 h«» began a firm friendship with George Stephenson, helping to build some of his earliest railways and winning fame as an engineer. He built railways at home and abroad, constructed London's Victoria Docks, and gave us the idea for the swins bridge, designing the first seen in England for the Norwich and Lowestoft railway. All this would have been enoush to give him a place among the notable men of his day-, but hvs chief j claim to lasting fame was his astonishing mathematical ability. As n child he was taught to count up to 100, and once he had learnt how to dc that he thought out his own methods of calculating. The power to see numbers in his mind's eye gave him a wonderful command over fia•ures. A Score of Figures in his Head It was not long before George Bidder's quickness in doing difficult sums made him much talked of, and his father soon found that he could make money by exhibiting him a? the calculating phenomenon. People would ask him to work out extremely complicated problems, and he would give them the answer within a few seconds. He was always right. He could carry a score or more of figures in his head, and his performances amazed everyone. 11 is probable that George would have had very little schooling had not a number of eminent men paid for him to go to one at Camberwell, from which he went on to Edinburgh, where he won a prize for mathematics in ISO 2. When little more than 30 he entered Parliament, and it was there his wonderful gifts were employed with outstanding success. O'n Parliamentary committees he was invaluable, for a single glance over long columns of figures enabled him to detect a flaw. When he had prcposa's to make he .could use figures n"wly set before him, working out sums which would have taken (Continued in next column).

exper's several hours. Of him it has been said that few have ever equalled his ability to juggle with figand that no one has ever excelled him.