Douglas Hume - a personal story

**Foreword** This book is the account of four generations of family leadership of a successful Glasgow engineering business, James Howden & Company Limited, which celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2004. Douglas Hume played a key role as Managing Director from 1964 to 1987 and he felt this remarkable anniversary was a fitting moment to record his reminiscences. **James Howden** It was in 1854 that James Howden decided to set up on his own as a consulting engineer in Glasgow at the age of 22. He was a man of rare foresight: he not only saw that ship’s boilers and engines needed to be more efficient, he had the technical skill and organizational ability to make it happen. His invention of a forced draught system in 1882 dramatically reduced the amount of coal needed for ships’ boilers; it was calculated that this saved 15 million tons of coal a year in the following thirty years, making fast oceanic crossings by steam ships much more practical and economic. This remarkable story is told in more detail in Chapter 3. **In perspective** The Foreword has two purposes: firstly, to put James Howden’s life and work in the perspective of his times and secondly, to introduce the members of the family who succeeded him. On the top floor of the People’s Palace on Glasgow Green, the popular museum of social history opened in 1898 in the city’s East End, there is a pictorial history of Glasgow enterprise, beginning in the 18th century and on up to today. On one of the walls there is this fine portrait of James Howden, in the company of some of the other important pioneers of that earlier period; he was one of a select group of entrepreneurs in the west of Scotland whose industrial activities led to Glasgow becoming known as the ‘Workshop of the Empire’ by the end of the 19th century. In the West End of the city, at the Museum of Transport and specifically in the Clyde Room of Ship Models, there is a magnificent display of scale models telling the history of Clyde shipbuilding, from the Comet in 1815 to the Queen Elizabeth 2. They line the walls for almost 300 feet and fill two rows of glass cabinets down the centre of the room. At the start of your visit, there is this rather gloomy forecast on the wall, from the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal of 1820: ‘The application of steam to vessels crossing the Atlantic is a subject of great importance…it is only proper that the disadvantages of it should be known…the immense consumption of coal and the occupation of holds by coal and machinery. There is no room left for cargo. It seems probable that for general purposes, steam will not be found applicable as a power for propelling ships across extensive seas.’ Then on a wall on the other side of the room as you finish the tour is this blunt message: ‘Between the years of 1870 to 1913, Clyde shipyards expanded dramatically but the industry was subject to periods of boom and slump. During depressions shippers cut freight rates and cancelled contracts for new ships. Shipbuilders responded by reducing their prices and offering special financial deals. Workers wages were cut, often triggering industrial unrest in the yards. This combination of boom and slump tended to force the smaller firms out of business.’ During much of that period, James Howden’s Company was one of those ‘smaller firms’. However, because his forced draught system and fans had become essential for ships, the Company survived the slumps and developed into a highly successful engineering business. **The next generation** James Howden’s nephew, James Howden Hume, who had worked closely with his uncle for over 30 years, took over the reins of the Company when James Howden died in 1913. This was at the time when power stations were coming into service in a big way and the Howden marine equipment was extensively adapted for these much larger land boilers. During this period two innovative Swedish inventions, the Ljungstrom air preheater and the Lysholm rotary screw compressor made vital contributions to the on-going success of the Company. **The Third generation** Both of James Howden Hume’s sons, Crawford William Hume and James (Jimmy) Howden Hume entered the business and continued the successful family leadership. Their father, like his uncle, was a talented inventor and also a shrewd financial manager; this was a quality Jimmy inherited, while Crawford was a brilliant engineer. The two brothers made a good team, each making their distinctive contributions to the Company from the First World War until the 1970s. **Fourth generation** Jimmy Hume’s son Douglas Hume served his apprenticeship on the shop floor from 1946 and graduated with an Honours B.Sc. degree in mechanical engineering from Glasgow University. He joined the management team of Howden in 1954, the Company’s 100th anniversary year. On succeeding his father as Managing Director 10 years later, Douglas Hume created a team of gifted engineers and other directors with varied skills, who built the Company into an international Group which became one of the largest in the world in the field of air and gas handling and energy conservation. During the 23 years Douglas was in charge, the Howden annual turnover increased from £5m to £500m and he tells how all this was achieved, in his inimitable style.