William R. Eckart, Jr. was born on June 17, 1841, in Chillicothe, Ohio, the son of William Roberts Eckart, Sr. and Eleanor Ann Carlisle.
In 1842 his parents moved to Cleveland where his father had shipping interests on the Great Lakes.
The boy’s education, begun in private schools, was continued in the public schools of Cleveland and at St. Clair Academy in that city, where Eckart, Jr. followed special studies with a view to becoming a civil engineer.
In the early fifties his father took his family to Zanesville, Ohio, where he had a managing interest in the Putnam Flouring Mills, the power for which was derived from water-wheels. William’s work as an assistant to the millwright in the installation of improved wheels led to an apprenticeship in the shop of Griffith, Ebert & Wedge, and later to an association with the partner Wedge, an engineer trained in the precision methods of the famous Whitworth shops of London. To the high ideals insisted on in all of the work of Griffith, Ebert & Wedge, Eckart, Jr. attributed much of his success in later years.
Contact with the marine work of the shop strengthened his taste for naval service, already formed by travel on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, and in 1861, after the outbreak of the Civil War, he passed with high honor the examination for naval engineer, was appointed, and ordered to join the fleet on the Pacific Coast. Here Eckart, Jr. met B. F. Isherwood, chief engineer of the navy, and was brought into intimate contact with the problems of marine engineering practise.
In 1864, because of ill health, he resigned from the navy and took up his residence in San Francisco. In California and in adjacent states he spent the remainder of his life.
As a chief draftsman in 1865, Eckart, Jr. prepared the designs for the first steam locomotive built in California. As superintendent of steam machinery at the United States Navy Yard, Mare Island, he designed and prepared the equipment for a notable research on marine propellers, and served as Isherwood’s associate in carrying out this work, the results of which have now become classic in the literature of marine engineering.
Later, as partner in an engineering firm at Marysville, California, Eckart, Jr. constructed a small steamer to be used on Lake Tahoe; it had a guaranteed speed of twenty-one miles per hour and was perhaps the fastest boat of its size known at that date. In connection with the great mining boom at Virginia City, Nevada, and elsewhere, 1870 - 1880, he encountered, as consulting engineer, the difficult problem of handling enormous quantities of scalding-hot water under pressures represented by thousands of feet of head, a combination of conditions perhaps unprecedented up to that time. Under his direction and guidance, however, mining was successfully carried on to the exhaustion of the ore bodies.
With the decline of deep mining in 1880 Eckart, Jr. again took up his residence in San Francisco. Here as consulting engineer he became responsible for the design of the machinery for the Anaconda Copper Company, with the new and difficult problems which this work presented, and later, as consultant for the Union Iron Works in all matters relating to naval construction, was associated with the pioneer work of building the new steel navy.
Finally, to round out the scope and variety of his professional experience, in 1899 he became, as consulting engineer for the Standard Electric Company, responsible for the design and construction of the hydraulic work connected with their first hydroelectric power plant, taking water at a 9, 000-foot level and under 1, 400 feet head generating 15, 000 horse-power - perhaps the pioneer among high head long distance transmission power plants. This work was brought to a successful completion in 1903. After a long period of failing health, during which William Eckart, Jr. retained his keen interest in engineering, he died on December 8, 1914, in Palo Alto, California, at the home of his eldest son.
William Roberts Eckart, Jr. was an American engineer, who designed and prepared the equipment for a notable research on marine propellers, and served as Isherwood’s associate in carrying out this work, the results of which have now become classic in the literature of marine engineering. In addition, Eckart, Jr. prepared the designs for the first steam locomotive built in California.
William R. Eckart, Jr. was a member of many engineering societies and technical organizations.
On August 14, 1872, William R. Eckart, Jr. married Harriet Louise Gorham; to them were born three sons and one daughter.
