Civil Engineers 
The word “macadamised” has entered into almost every language. It comes, of course, from J. Loudon McAdam, born at Ayr, who devised “macadamised” roads. McAdam, the road-maker, a Scot, and Telford, the civil engineer, the bridge-builder, also a Scot. Thomas Telford’s masterpieces were the Caledonian Canal and the Menai Suspension Bridge. Designing Edinburgh’s high-level Dean Bridge was perhaps Telford’s last work before he retired.
Telford was born in Eskdale. John Rennie, another Scottish civil engineer, born at Phantassie, East Lothian, engineered the Kennet and Avon Canal, the Rochdale Canal, and the Lancaster Canal. He also built Waterloo Bridge and designed London Bridge, which was built after his death. He also designed and constructed the breakwater at Plymouth.
Sir William Fairbairn, a native of Kelso, built the Conway and Menai tubular bridges in 1845. It was an eminent Scottish engineer, another Kelso man, Sir James Brunlees, who laid the first railway line across the Alps.
A resident of Islay, a Spencer Wilks, was president of the Rover Motor Company. The Land Rover was originated by Mr Spencer Wilks and his brother Maurice, and was first tested on “Islay’s hills and beaches”.
Sir John Sinclair, 1754-1835, was born at Thurso Castle in Caithness. He founded the British Wool Society, and he persuaded Pitt to form a Board of Agriculture, 1793, of which he was the first President 1793-98 and 1806-13.
George Eliot, the brilliant English novelist, was discovered by a Scottish publisher, John Blackwood and all her novels but one were published by him.
Sir Wm. Hunter, geographer, born at Aberdeen, planned and carried out the first census of India in 1872. The man who successfully advocated the use of lime juice in the British Navy as a prophylactic against scurvy was a Scotsman, an astronomer not a doctor, Robert Blair, born near Edinburgh.
The American who was the first man to set foot on the moon had the 100 percent Scottish name of Neil Armstrong!
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