THE PITMAN CENTENARY.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 14, 15 January 1913, Page 7

THE PITMAN CENTENARY.

Ono hundred years ago on January 4, 1813 —Isaac Pitman was horn at Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England, and though no big guns were fired this year, the occasion is more than usually interesting as marking the centenary of the man whose invention of shorthand has done more for the world’s progress than is within the power of any individual to calculate. There are many systems of shorthand-writing now in active use, some of which are claimed to be simpler than Pitman’s, yet judged from the standpoint of results, Pitman stands so far alone that the terms “Shorthand” and “Pitman” are to many people almost synonymous. f In his early years Pitman, the son of a cloth manufacturer, was a studious and religiously disposed youth, who gravitated through a manufacturer’s office into the teaching profession, from which he was ejected because of his association with the Swedcnborgian Church. Ho had previously interested himself in writing by sound, and in 1837 published his first edition of what was then called “Stenographic Sound Hand,” the second edition of which, published in association with A. J. Ellis, came out in 1840, under its present name of “Phonography,” at the'same time that the penny post was first introduced in England. In 1842, the ‘Phonetic Journal’ was established, and the success of the new system of quick writing was such that whilst ho had large business premises at Bath, an establishment was also opened in London.

In 1862, Pitman’s exertions were publicly recognised, in England, when ho was presented with £350 and a marble timepiece, and on the occasion of his jubilee in 1887 he was made the recipient of a marble bust of himself. His system was afterwards recognised by the Education Departments of several Governments, and three years before his death, which occurred on January 22, 1897, he received the welldeserved honour of knighthood.