RENNIE, John (1761-1821). A British civil engineer. He was born at Phantassie, in Haddingtonshire, and obtained his preliminary education at the Parish school of Prestonkirk, and supplemented it by two years at Dunbar, where he studied pure mathematics. After serving as a workman he studied at Edinburgh, and in 1780 secured employment at the works of Boulton & Watt at Soho, near Birmingham. Here his mechanical genius soon displayed itself; and so highly did Watt esteem Rennie that he gave him, in 1789, the sole direction of the construction and fitting up of the machinery of the Albion Mills, London; and the ingenious improvements effected in the wheel-work, shafting, and frames were so striking that Rennie at once rose into general notice as an engineer of great promise. To this mill engineering he added, about 1799, the construction of bridges; and in this branch also his talent and ingenuity were manifest. The elegance and solidity of his constructions, the chief examples of which were at Kelso, Leeds, Musselburg, Newton-Stewart, Boston, and New Galloway, were universally admired; Rennie's greatest work of this kind was the Waterloo Bridge over the Thames. Another of his works was the Southwark Bridge, which was built on a new principle, with cast-iron arches resting on stone piers. He also drew up the plan for the London Bridge, which, however, was not commenced until after his death. He superintended the execution of the Grand Western Canal in Somerset, the Polbrook Canal in Cornwall, the canal joining the Don and Dee in Aberdeen, that between Arundel and Portsmouth, and, chief of all, the Kennet and Avon Canal between Newbury and Bath. The London Docks, the East and West India docks (see Dock) at Blackwall with their freight sheds, the Hull Docks, the Prince's Docks at Liverpool, and those of Dublin, Greenock, and Leith, were all designed and wholly or partially executed under his superintendence. He also planned many improvements of harbors and on the dock yards of Portsmouth, Chatham, Sheerness, and Plymouth, executing at the last-mentioned port the most remarkable of all his naval works, the celebrated breakwater. (See Breakwater.) Rennie died October 16, 1821, and was buried in Saint Paul's Cathedral, London. Consult Smiles, Lives of the Engineers (London, 1861-62; rev. ed. 1874).
RENNIE, Sir John (1794-1874) . An English civil engineer. He was born in London of a great engineering family, being a son of John Rennie (1761-1821), with whom he studied until 1813, when he became Hollingsworth's assistant on the Waterloo Bridge. With his father he worked on the Southwark Bridge in 1815, and after studying abroad went into partnership with his brother. John Rennie was knighted in 1831 on the completion of the London Bridge after his father's plans. He also finished his father's work as engineer to the Admiralty, building the Plymouth breakwater, and draining the Lincolnshire fens. The Whitehaven and Cardiff docks and the restoration of Boston harbor are the most important of his original works. Rennie was an able hydraulic engineer and author of Theory, Formation, and Construction of British and Foreign Harbors (1851-54). Consult his autobiography (London, 1875).
RE′NO. The largest city of Nevada and the county-seat of Washoe County, 31 miles south of Carson City; on the Truckee River, and on the Southern Pacific, the Virginia and Truckee, and the Nevada, California and Oregon railroads (Map: Nevada, D 2). It is the seat of the Nevada State University, opened in 1886; and among other features are the United States Government Agricultural Experiment Station and the Nevada State Hospital for Mental Diseases. Reno is situated in a section devoted to farming, mining, and stock-raising, and is the most important business and industrial centre in the State. Settled in 1868, Reno was incorporated in 1897, but was disincorporated two years later. It received its present city charter in 1903. Population, in 1890, 3563; in 1900, 4500.
RENO, Jesse Lee (1823-62). An American soldier, born at Wheeling, Va. (now W. Va.). He graduated at West Point in 1846; was brevetted second lieutenant of ordnance; and soon afterwards was ordered to the front in Mexico, where he fought under General Scott from Vera Cruz to the City of Mexico. From that time until 1861 he was employed in various routine duties and advanced to be captain. On the outbreak of the Civil War he was commissioned brigadier-general of volunteers and was assigned to a brigade in General Burnside's North Carolina expedition (December 20, 1861-April, 1862), with which he participated in the capture of Roanoke Island, and the actions of Newbern and Camden. For these services he was promoted to be major-general of volunteers, and in August was ordered north to Virginia, where he fought in the second battle of Bull Run and at Chantilly. During the succeeding Maryland campaign he commanded the Ninth Corps, and was killed leading his men at the battle of South Mountain.
RENOIR, re-nwär′, Auguste (1841—). A French figure and landscape painter, born in Limoges. He studied in the atelier of Gleyre and with Monet and the other Impressionists, and exhibited in 1874 at the first Impressionist Salon. Renoir is one of the most distinctive of the group, and, like Degas, devoted himself principally to figures, especially portraits of young women and children, in which he renders the texture of flesh and the most fleeting shades of expression with astonishing adroitness. His figures are painted out of doors, and are subject to every variation of light and reflection. He also painted landscape, fruit, and flower subjects, and groups of figures. His paintings include: “La loge;” “La danse;” “Danse à la ville;” “Le déjeuner à Bougival;” “La balancoire;” “Le pont de Chatou;” and “Jeunes filles au piano.” Among his portraits are those of Wagner and Claude Monet. Consult: Duret, Les peintres impressionistes . . . (Paris, 1879), and Alexandre, Catalogue de l'Exposition de A. Renoir (Paris, 1892).
RENOUF, re-nōōf′, Emile (1845-94). A French landscape, marine, and genre painter, born in Paris. He was a pupil of Boulanger, Lefebvre, and Carolus Duran. His works usually represent scenes in the lives of fisherfolk or purely marine subjects. “The Helping Hand” (in the Corcoran Gallery at Washington, D. C.), a boatman rowing while his child holds the oar, is one of his best-known works. He also painted several views near Honfleur, and a picture of the
