Alexander Russell (electrical engineer)

{{Short description|Scottish electrical engineer and educator}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2018}}

{{Use British English|date=January 2018}}

{{Infobox person

| honorific_prefix =

| name = Alexander Russell

| image = Alexander_Russell_(electrical_engineer).png

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| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1861|7|15|df=yes}}

| birth_place = Ayr, Scotland

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1943|1|14|1861|7|15|df=yes}}

| death_place =

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| citizenship = Scottish

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| education = Glasgow University

Caius College, Cambridge

| module = {{Infobox engineering career

| discipline = Electrical engineering

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| employer =

| significant_projects = Alternating current

| significant_design =

| significant_advance =

| significant_awards = Faraday Medal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers}}

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}}

Alexander Russell, FRS (15 July 1861 – 14 January 1943) was a Scottish electrical engineer and educator.{{cite journal|title= Alexander Russell|journal= Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society|volume= 4|issue= 12|pages= 427–428|publisher= JSTOR|jstor = 769050|last1 = Campbell|first1 = A.|year= 1943|doi=10.1098/rsbm.1943.0013}}

He was born in Ayr, Scotland and educated at Glasgow University (gaining an MA in Mathematics and Physics) and Caius College, Cambridge. He was later (in 1924) awarded a doctorate.

After teaching mathematics at Cheltenham College and the Oxford Military College, he took a post at Faraday House, in Southampton Row, London, which had been newly founded to train electrical engineers. In 1909 he became the Principal, a position he held until 1939. There he pioneered the sandwich course, whereby students had a year or so in the classroom and then experienced work in industry before returning to the classroom. He also wrote a number of articles for the journal Electrician which he later published in book form.

He acted as President or vice-President of a number of societies, including the presidency of the Physical Society in 1922–24 and of the Institute of Electrical Engineers in 1923. In 1924 he was also elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, his citation acknowledging that he was "Distinguished for his knowledge of alternating current phenomena, inductances and electrostatics."{{cite web| url = https://collections.royalsociety.org/DServe.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqCmd=Show.tcl&dsqDb=Persons&dsqPos=72&dsqSearch=%28%28text%29%3D%27russell%27%29|title= Fellow details|publisher= Royal Society|accessdate= 19 October 2014}}

In 1940 he was awarded the Faraday Medal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers.

He died in 1943 after a long illness. He had married Edith, the daughter of H.B.Ince, MP, and had a son and a daughter.