{{Short description|Icelandic-American inventor}} {{Infobox person | name = Chester H. Thordarson | image = | alt = | caption = Hjörtur Þórðarson | birth_name = | birth_date = {{Birth date|1867|05|12}} | birth_place = Iceland (Kingdom of Denmark) | death_date = {{Death date and age|1945|1|6|1867|5|12|df=yes}} | death_place = Chicago, Illinois | death_cause = | citizenship = | resting_place = Rock Island, Wisconsin | resting_place_coordinates = | education = dropped out of 7th grade at age 20 | module = {{Infobox engineering career | discipline = Electrical engineering | institutions = | practice_name = | employer = | significant_projects = Alternating current,<br />high-voltage, high-frequency power experiments, transformer design, transformer manufacturing | significant_design = Power grid, electrical transformer | significant_advance = | significant_awards = {{collapsible list | title = }} }} | signature = | signature_alt = }}
'''Chester Hjortur Thordarson''' (May 12, 1867 – January 6, 1945) — born '''Hjörtur Þórðarson''' — was an Icelandic-American inventor and manufacturer of electrical apparatus who eventually held nearly a hundred technology patents<ref>{{cite web|url= http://washingtonisland-wi.com/chester-thordarson-rock-island/|title= Chester Thordarson & Rock Island |publisher =Washington Island Chamber of Commerce|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url= http://islandheritageconservancy.com/ihc-Thordarson.html |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20130928153812/http://islandheritageconservancy.com/ihc-Thordarson.html |url-status= usurped |archive-date= September 28, 2013 |title= Thordarson |publisher = Washington Island Heritage Conservancy Corp|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref> related to transformers, inductors, high voltage coils, and more.
==Biography== Thordarson immigrated to the United States from Iceland in 1873 with his parents Gudrun Grimsdotter and Thordur Arnason. In 1887, Thordarson took a job in Chicago, Illinois, working for Chicago Edison Co. In 1895, he founded the Thordarson Electric Manufacturing Company, a manufacturing company in Chicago that produced industrial and commercial transformers. Thordarson's company is now called Thordarson Meissner, Inc. and has locations in Mount Carmel, Illinois, and Henderson, Nevada.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://thordarsonmagnetics.com/history.php|title= Celebrating 120 Years Of Global Technology|publisher= Thordarson Meisner Inc|accessdate= April 25, 2016|url-status= dead|archiveurl= https://web.archive.org/web/20151205074613/http://www.thordarsonmagnetics.com/history.php|archivedate= December 5, 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.uwgb.edu/voyageur/archive_22_1_rockisland.pdf |title=Archived copy |accessdate=2008-06-10 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110608070307/http://www.uwgb.edu/voyageur/archive_22_1_rockisland.pdf |archivedate=2011-06-08 }}</ref>
He was instrumental in the development of the modern energy transmission grid with his work in transformers. He achieved his first distinction at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis, where for the Purdue University exhibit he designed and built the first million-volt transformer. For his efforts he won the fair's gold medal.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.fori.us/chester.htm|title= Chester H. Thordarson |publisher= Friends of Rock Island State Park|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.pddnet.com/article/2012/03/2011-design-engineer-hall-fame-chester-hjortur-thordarson|title= Chester Hjortur Thordarson |publisher = Design Engineer Hall of Fame |date= March 8, 2011|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref>
==Legacy==
===Rock Island===
In 1910, Thordarson began purchasing property on Rock Island, an island off the tip Wisconsin's Door Peninsula. Thordarson established a private vacation retreat on Rock Island.<ref>[https://www.pbs.org/video/in-wisconsin-rock-island-chester-thordarson-1/ Rock Island: Chester Thordarson], ''In Wisconsin'', Wisconsin PBS, May 5th, 2011, 7:28 video</ref> He was intensely interested in preserving the island’s natural beauty. In 1965 the state of Wisconsin purchased Rock Island from his heirs. Thordarson's former estate has been designated Rock Island State Park. His buildings, including the water tower, were added to the National Register of Historic Places as the Thordarson Estate Historic District during 1985.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.com/WI/Door/districts.html|title= Thordarson Estate Historic District |publisher=National Register of Historic Places|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Thordarson Estate Historic District |url=http://landmarkhunter.com/191024-thordarson-estate-historic-district/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160603030020/http://landmarkhunter.com/191024-thordarson-estate-historic-district/ |archive-date=June 3, 2016 |accessdate=April 25, 2016 |publisher=Landmark Hunter}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |author=Sharyn Alden |title=Rock Island park offers raw beauty and a past preserved |url=https://archive.jsonline.com/features/travel/94616079.html |accessdate=September 20, 2023 |publisher=The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel}}</ref>
thumb|300 px|right|Chester Thordarson's boathouse on Rock Island
===Book collection=== Thordarson bequeathed his book collection to the University of Wisconsin. The Thordarson collection was estimated to be worth one million dollars in 1945 (equivalent to ${{Format price|{{Inflation|US|1000000|1945}}}} in {{Inflation-year|US}}){{Inflation-fn|US}} and led to the establishment of the rare books room of the University of Wisconsin Memorial Library.<ref>{{cite web|url= https://search.library.wisc.edu/catalog/999931225502121|title= Thordarson Collection |publisher = Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System|accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref><ref>''U.W. Library News'', March 1966</ref> Jen Christian Bay, a member of the Bibliographical Society of America, commented on the collection in 1929:<ref>Ralph Hagedorn, "Bibliotheca Thordarsoniana: The Sequel," in PAPERS of the Bibliographical Society of America, Vo. 44 (Q1, 1950). Dr. Bay's essay later formed a chapter in the Fortune of Books, (Chicago, 1941), 105-121</ref> *"Of William Copland, ''The Craft of Grafting'' (1560), two copies are known, one in the Thordarson Collection" *"Of the greatest [herbal] of all, the ''Hortus Sanitatis'', Mr. Thordarson's copy of the edition of 1561 is a remarkably beautiful copy...." *[Of the 1540 ''A Boke of the Proertyes of Herbes'':] "This book is one of Mr. Thordarson's discoveries; no copy is known in any other library." *[Of H. Baker's ''The Wellspring of Sciences'':] "The British Museum seemingly possesses no copy with an earlier date than 1574. Mr Thordarson's copy [of 1564] seems unique."
==Awards== Among his awards and honors, the University of Wisconsin and the University of Iceland conferred honorary doctorate degrees. He was awarded medals from the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904 and the Panama–Pacific International Exposition in 1916. King Christian X of Denmark presented Thordarson with the Order of the Falcon in 1939.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://washingtonisland-wi.com/|title= Chester Thordarson's Rock Island |publisher= Voyageur|author= Tim Sweet |date= 2005 |accessdate= April 25, 2016}}</ref>
==Patents==
{{Empty section|date=August 2016}}
==Death== Thordarson died of heart failure in Chicago, Illinois on January 6, 1945.
== See also == {{Portalbar|Electronics|Energy|Engineering|Physics|Technology}} *Charles Proteus Steinmetz – a contemporaneous electrical pioneer in alternating current and high voltage research *Nikola Tesla
==References== {{Reflist|2}}
==Further reading== *Cartwright, Carol Lohry (1986) "[http://content.wisconsinhistory.org/cdm/ref/collection/wmh/id/36176 Rock Island: The Personification of Chester H. Thordarson]". ''The Wisconsin Magazine of History'', Vol. 69, No. 3 (Spring, 1986): 211-227. *Eaton, Conan Bryant (1969) ''Rock Island, a part of the Washington Township'' (Jackson Harbor Press) {{ISBN|1-890352-19-5}} *Purinton, Richard (2013) ''Thordarson and Rock Island'' (Island Bayou Press) {{ISBN|978-0-692-02006-7}}
==External links== *[https://web.archive.org/web/20071209141951/http://www.thordarsonmagnetics.com/ Thordarson Meissner, Inc. website] *[http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/parks/name/rockisland/ Rock Island State Park website] *[http://washingtonisland-wi.com/site-2016/wp-content/uploads/archive_22_1_rockisland.pdf Chester Thordarson's Rock Island] {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thordarson, Chester}} Category:1867 births Category:1945 deaths Category:People from Door County, Wisconsin Category:American inventors Chester Thordarson Category:American businesspeople in manufacturing Category:People associated with electricity Category:American electrical engineers Category:Businesspeople from Chicago Category:Recipients of the Order of the Falcon Category:19th-century American engineers Category:20th-century American engineers Category:American futurologists Category:American humanists Category:American mechanical engineers Category:Scientists from New York City Category:Wireless energy transfer Category:Engineers from New York (state) Category:Engineers from Illinois