Solomon R. Dresser | |
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| Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromPennsylvania's21st district | |
| In office March 4, 1903 – March 3, 1907 | |
| Preceded by | Summers Melville Jack |
| Succeeded by | Charles Frederick Barclay |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1842-02-01)February 1, 1842 |
| Died | January 21, 1911(1911-01-21) (aged 68) |
| Party | Republican |
Solomon Robert Dresser (February 1, 1842 – January 21, 1911) was an inventor and aRepublican member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromPennsylvania.
Solomon R. Dresser was born inLitchfield, Michigan. He attended the common schools andHillsdale College. He engaged in agricultural pursuits until 1865. He became an inventor ofoil andgas well equipment, and moved toPennsylvania in 1872, when thePennsylvania oil rush was nearing its end, to work in the production of oil and gas.
The problem he first tackled was preventing dirty surfacegroundwater from contaminating oil pumped from wells, which was accomplished by so-called "packers" sealing the gap between the well and the tube for pumping the oil. By the late 1870s, he developed a new type of packer utilizing a tube-like rubber seal squeezed during operation, and in 1880 patented his invention[1] and foundedS.R. Dresser Manufacturing Co. to commercialize it.[2]
Later in the 1880s, he started developing pipeline connectors, and after several patents in 1886-1889 arrived to a leakproof flexible design featuring, just like his packer, a squeezable tube-like rubber seal. This Dresser joint or Dresser coupling for the first time enabled long-range transmission ofnatural gas,[3] displaced all the other alternatives on the market and became ade facto standard in the industry by late 1890s,[4] continuing at least into 1920s.[5] Dresser type couplings are still manufactured and used today for various plumbing, infrastructure, and insutrial applications.
In 1903, he left business and engineering in favor of politics. Dresser was elected as a Republican to theFifty-eighth andFifty-ninth Congresses. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1906. He resumed former business pursuits and died inBradford, Pennsylvania in 1911; he was originally interred in Oak Hill Cemetery, but his son (unhappy with the maintenance of the cemetery) had the 20 foot obelisk and the families graves moved to Willowdale Cemetery.
| U.S. House of Representatives | ||
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| Preceded by | Member of the U.S. House of Representatives fromPennsylvania's 21st congressional district 1903–1907 | Succeeded by |
