ABSTRACT
Introduction: The Early Years The 1854 patent by William Boutland Wilkinson of Newcastle upon Tyne was the first to propose the use of iron as reinforcement to concrete, recognizing the relative weakness of concrete in tension. 1 Like those of the Frenchmen Lambot and Franc;ois Coignet in 1855, Wilkinson's patent attracted little interest in the British building industry. It was not until1892 that Franc;ois Hennebique, a French contractor, obtained a British patent for his system which, with others later, would find wide use in Britain. 2
2. The concern was to provide an economical and fire-resistant form of construction-something which was widely sought as a solution to the fatal and expensive
fires that frequently consumed mills, warehouses and public buildings in particular. Hurst in Paper 326 has reviewed the later nineteenth-century solutions; these were based on beams and columns of iron or steel, and although floors such as brick vaulting and flat and vaulted concrete slabs were themselves 'fireproof', they did not always protect the vulnerable bottom flanges of the beams, nor the columns.
