THE Principal Surveyor and Secretary of Lloyds' Register of Shipping at Glasgow, is a son of Mr. Thomas Dodd, late Examiner of Contract Work for the Admiralty, who was well known by the shipbuilders on the Clyde from 1862 to 1890 in connection with the building of the first armour-clad men-of-war.
    He was born in April, 1847, at Portsmouth, where he was brought up and received his education. Afterwards he passed a very good examination before the Civil Service Commissioners in 1861, ranking first of all the candidates presented, and he entered Portsmouth Dockyard as a shipwright apprentice. Having passed another good examination in the fifth year of his apprenticeship, he received from the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty a scholarship for two years. During that time he underwent a superior course of training, being taught the principles of design, properties of vessels, etc., and was instructed in the actual work of laying off and ship construction. For his success at half-yearly examinations, which were conducted by the General Director of Education, he also received valuable prizes from the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty in the years 1864, 1865, and 1867.
    On the completion of the seven years he received his indentures, and was employed both in building and laying off wooden and iron ships. Then in December, 1868, he was appointed an assistant overseer of iron and composite vessels being built by contract for H.M. Service, In this capacity he was employed on the armour-clad frigates Swiftsure and Triumph {complete iron vessels sheathed with wood), on the turret ship Cyclops, on four iron gun vessels, and on the iron troopship Assistance, built for H.M. Service.
    Mr. Dodd was contemporary with Sir Philip Watts, K.C.B., the present Chief Constructor of the Navy, who received the Admiralty Scholarship at Portsmouth at the same time.
    He was appointed Surveyor to Lloyds' Register of British and Foreign Shipping in May, 1873, and was employed in the London office, and as Surveyor at Leith and Sunderland until November, 1874. While in London, among other important work, he assisted the late Mr. Martell in the preparation of the first Freeboard Tables, which were ultimately, in 1890, accepted by the Government as the basis for assigning freeboards to vessels in the Mercantile Marine. In November, 1874, he was appointed exclusive Surveyor at Genoa, Italy, with charge of the office there, and he superintended, for classification in Lloyds' Register, the construction of a very large number of the wooden vessels then built along the Mediterranean coast from Savona to Sestri Levante. At the same time, in addition to this duty, he held important surveys at Malta and Marseilles on vessels heavily damaged. In December, 1877, he was temporarily appointed to Marseilles for four or five months, after which he returned to London. and was employed partly in the office there and partly in surveying duties on the river Thames.
    In June, 1878, he was again sent to Marseilles, where, for about six months, he fulfilled important special duties, and in February, 1880, he was promoted to his present post in Glasgow.
    At the time of his coming north there were, in the Glasgow district, only eight Surveyors connected with Lloyds' Register. Now there are thirty-one. In November, 1889, he was appointed Principal Surveyor for the Glasgow district, having acted in that position for about twelve months previously. When the Glasgow Committee of Lloyds' Register of British and Foreign Shipping was formed in June, 1900, he was appointed its Secretary in addition to his principal surveyorship.
    Mr. Dodd is well known by all the shipbuilders on the Clyde. During his twenty-seven years in Glasgow he has been more or less connected with all the improvements from time to time made in iron and steel shipbuilding, and he has superintended the construction of most of the large mercantile vessels built in the district during that time.
    Mr. Dodd has been a Member of the Institution of Naval Architects since 1875, and is also a Member of the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland.

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