At Birkenhead he
made some accurate measurements of the electrical properties of
materials used in submarine cables. Sir William Thomson says he was
the first to apply the absolute methods of measurement introduced by
Gauss and Weber. He also investigated there the laws of electric
signals in submarine cables. As Secretary to the British Association
Committee on Electrical Standards he played a leading part in providing
electricians with practical standards of measurement. His Cantor
lectures on submarine cables, and his treatise on ELECTRICITY AND
MAGNETISM, published in 1873, were notable works at the time, and
contained the latest development of their subjects. He was associated
with Sir William Thomson in an ingenious 'curb-key' for sending signals
automatically through a long cable; but although tried, it was not
adopted. His most important invention was Telpherage, a means of
transporting goods and passengers to a distance by electric panniers
supported on a wire or conductor, which supplied them with electricity.
It was first patented in 1882, and Jenkin spent his last years on this
work, expecting great results from it; but ere the first public line was
opened for traffic at Glynde, in Sussex, he was dead.
In mechanical engineering his graphical methods of calculating strains
in bridges, and determining the efficiency of mechanism, are of much
value.
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