TANGYE, Sir RICHARD (1833–1906), engineer, born at Broad Lane, Illogan, Cornwall, on 24 Nov. 1833, was fifth son in a family of six sons and three daughters of Joseph Tangye, a quaker Cornish miner of Redruth, who afterwards became a small shopkeeper and farmer there, by Anne (d. 1851), daughter of Edward Bullock, a small farmer and engine driver. After attending the British school at Illogan, and helping his father on his farm, he was at the age of eight disabled for manual labour through fracturing his right arm, and spent three years (1844-7) at a school at Redruth kept by William Lamb Bellows, father of John Bellows [q. v. Suppl. II]; thence he went in February 1847 to the Friends' School, Sidcot, Somerset, where he formed a lifelong friendship with William Tallack [q. v. Suppl. II]. He remained there as pupil teacher and assistant until 1851; in that year he visited with his brother James the Great Exhibition in London.
Finding the teaching profession uncongenial, Tangye at the end of 1852, in reply to an advertisement, went to Birmingham and entered the office of Thomas Worsdell, a quaker engineer, as clerk at 50l. a year. His younger brother George soon joined him as junior clerk; they were followed by two other brothers, James and Joseph, mechanical experts who had worked under Brunei for Mr. Brunton, engineer to the West Cornwall railway, and had made a hydraulic press which favourably impressed Brunel.
At Birmingham Tangye soon obtained a complete grasp of the commercial details of the engineering business, and he proved his interest in the welfare of the workmen by obtaining the firm's assent to a half-holiday on Saturdays, a concession to labour which was subsequently adopted in England universally. In 1855, owing to a difference with his employer, Richard left the firm. Soon he and three brothers, including Joseph, who had made himself an expert lathemaker, began to manufacture tools and machinery on their own account, renting a room at 40 Mount Street, Birmingham, for 4s. a week. The brothers prospered, and took a large workshop for 10s. a week, bought an engine and boiler to supply their own motive power, and took one workman into their employ. In 1856 Brunel, mindful of James and Joseph's earlier efforts, commissioned the brother's at Birmingham to supply him with hydraulic lifting jacks to launch the 'Great Eastern' steamship. The successful performance of this commission proved the first step in the firm's prosperity. In 1858 the brothers bought the sole right to manufacture differential pulley blocks, recently invented by Mr. J. A. Weston; but rival claims to the patent rights involved them in 1858 in a long and costly though successful lawsuit. A fifth brother, Edward, joined them that year. The firm now devoted itself solely to the manufacture of machinery and every kind of power machine. The growth of the industry led to their removal in 1859 to new premises in Clement Street, Birmingham; three years later the firm acquired three acres of land at Soho, three miles from Birmingham, and built there the 'Cornwall Works.' Ultimately this factory through Richard's skill, energy, and business acumen absorbed thirty acres of surrounding land and gave employment to 3000 hands. Works in Belgium were established under Edward's management in 1863; a London warehouse was added in 1868, and branches were subsequently formed at Newcastle, Manchester, Glasgow, Sydney, Melbourne, and Johannesburg. One of the engineering successes of the firm was the use of their hydraulic jacks in placing Cleopatra's Needle (weighing over 186 tons) on its present site on the Thames Embankment on 12 Sept. 1878. The firm became a limited liability company, 'Tangyes Limited,' on 1 Jan. 1882.
The brothers were considerate employers. In 1872, in which year the three elder brothers, James, Joseph, and Edward, retired from the business, Richard permanently instituted the Saturday half-holiday which he had pressed on his first employer twenty years earlier, and he averted a strike by granting unasked a nine hours day. In 1876 Tangye instituted at the works a large dining-hall, educational classes, concerts, and lectures, with which his friend, Dr. J. A. Langford [q. v. Suppl. II], was closely associated.
In the religious, municipal, and political life of Birmingham Tangye took an active share. In his early days there he helped Joseph Sturge [q. v.] at the Friends' Sunday schools. A staunch liberal in politics, he supported John Bright in every election at Birmingham but refused many invitations to stand for parliament himself. He was a firm free trader, and remained loyal to Gladstone after the home rule split of 1886,
