Isambard Isambard Kingdom BrunelKingdom Brunel

Should be on the next £5 note!!!

Early Life• In 1806, Brunel was born in Portsmouth.•Growing up, people realised that he was actually very clever. He apparently also had a sort of ‘sixth sense’. He predicted that a building opposite his school would fall down, and 3 days later, it did just that!

• Leaving school, he was headed for Paris, to become an apprentice watchmaker. He worked in a shop in the centre of Paris for 13 months selling, making and repairing watches until at the age of 17, he decided to go back to London to work in his Father’s Engineering shop.

• Brunel’s first ever job was one that his father had appointed him. It was to design and oversee the building of... The Thames Tunnel!• This was an engineering marvel, it was one of the first tunnels in the world!

•Unfortunately, a short time after being built, it collapsed, seriously injuring Brunel.

The Bridge across the River Failure

• After recovering from his serious injury, he went to Bristol to enter a competition. •He won the competition and had successfully built a bridge over the River Avon.

Portfolio• Isambard was always thinking o new ways to improve the way in which we humans lived. •He always worked very hard and documented his ideas. He documented them in notepads with diagrams and annotations.

His Family Life • Brunel had met a woman called Mary who he later married in Bristol. They had three children and loved to do magic tricks for them. The children were very proud of their father and wanted to be just like him when they grew up.

The Railways• One day, Isambard just decided that he wanted to build a railway, connecting Bristol and London. • He became Chief Engineer in 1833 and watched over the whole project. There were many benefits of the railway, and the people of Great Britain loved him!

• People could now get fresh meat, milk and eggs.• Goods could be transported cheaper• The cost of coal in Liverpool would go down• It would improve the tourist industry • People get newspapers, every day!• People could go for cheap holidays

The Great Britain• Brunel then later thought, why not connect Bristol to New York, I’ve already designed the harbour so I can build a ship with its strengths for the good of it...•He later created the Great Britain

The Great Western•He later then decided to build a bigger and better ship, the Great Western, which was just an improvement of the Great Britain!

The Great Eastern• He went on to build what was unfortunately his final ship. This was the biggest boat in the world at it’s time! It was very hard to launch but could carry a whole years export in one voyage! The Great Western had an iron hull because saw the opportunity to make the ship better with this quality.

His Bridges• Brunel built many bridges in his time and perhaps the most famous could be the Clifton suspension bridge of the Avon Gorge, also his first ever bridge. It was the first bridge at the time to take advantage of the new way of building these mega structures.

...• Because without him, we wouldn’t have the world we have today! We wouldn’t have railways, ships, suspension bridges, the Thames tunnel, none of it. He has revolutionised the way we engineer things and the study of engineering.