People Australia

Henry Percival Moss, 1944

Supplied by author

Henry Percival Moss (1883-1954), electrical engineer, was born on 14 May 1883 at Wanghua, Victoria, one of seven children of Australian-born Frances (Fanny) Victoria Henrietta Moss, née Trewin, and English-born bootmaker James Moss. Henry attended state primary schools up to the age of fourteen, then was privately tutored. After leaving school, he was a day student (1902-04) at the Melbourne Working Men’s College (later Melbourne Technical College), graduating as an electrical engineer. During his final year at the college Moss was employed there as a lecturer and administrator.

From 1904 Moss worked as an electrical engineer at Cassilis Gold mining lease Tongio in eastern Victoria, during which time he carried out an investigation and survey and called tenders for a hydro-electric power source for the mine. In 1906 he arranged the installation of an electric turbine pump at New Havillah on Charlotte Plain while employed by Austral Otis Engineering. After completing practical requirements, he was awarded a diploma of associates (1906). Moss subsequently worked as lecturer in the School of Mining, Charters Towers, Queensland from 1906 until June 1908 when he returned to assist with the installation of the hydro-electric power station at Tongio West.  This included transmission lines, a substation, and transformers for the Cassilis Gold Mine. He continued as engineer in charge until the mine closure in 1910. He was then appointed as consultant electrical engineer to F.A. McCarty & Company, setting up the Great Lake Scheme for the Tasmanian Hydro-Electric Commission.[1] During this time, on 16 December 1908 in Toorak, he married New Zealand-born Gertrude E. Maxwell.

In 1913 Moss joined the Department of Home Affairs, having been appointed to the Commonwealth public service as chief electrical engineer for the Commonwealth.[2] He was in Canberra for the ‘turning of the first sod’ in 1913. In his early work in this role he was occupied by the construction, commissioning, and maintenance of electrical power generation and distribution services throughout the Commonwealth. During 1914-15 most of his time was devoted to the design, construction, and installation of Canberra Power Station, as well as other sites. While based in Melbourne, as chief electrical engineer he contributed significantly to the physical and economic development of Canberra, particularly with the design and implementation of electrical services for the provisional Parliament House and east and west block offices in Acton. The installation of electricity supply in Canberra occurred under his supervision in 1914.[3] He used a motorcycle to get around in the early days.[4]

After he moved with his family to Canberra in 1929, Moss was appointed the chief engineer at the Department of the Interior in May 1930. Departmental responsibilities for Canberra’s utilities were split in that year: the Department of Works and Railways took control of water and sewerage, while the Federal Capital Territory Branch of the Department of Home Affairs was allocated electrical services. As chief electrical engineer of the Commonwealth Department of Works, Moss became the officer responsible for Canberra’s electricity supply in May 1930. This included the commissioning of the lighting and power supply to various domestic and commercial sites in emerging ACT suburbs and the Cotter Dam Pumping Station.

Moss was also engaged with the wider community. He delivered lectures to various groups, such as: ‘Thirty Years of Engineering’, a talk to the Institute of Engineering in 1930; a lecture on the Mercury vapour lamp for street use, given to the Royal Society 1934; and ‘Sidelights of the Electric Supply to Canberra’, addressing the cost of electricity to the Canberra Chamber of Commerce in 1935. Among his community roles was chairman (1937-38) of the Canberra Division of the Institute of Engineers.                      

As the result of a serious leg injury when he was fifty-six, Moss was afflicted with a limp which required his wearing a leg calliper for the rest of his adult years. In 1939 he acquired a second-hand vehicle, a 1936 model American-made Hupmobile, which he was able to press into service during wartime fuel restrictions by the use of a fitted ‘gas-producer’, utilising carbon monoxide gas until fuel became available again.[5] It is probable he designed this fuel source if not invented it.     

During the war Moss took on additional responsibilities as chief controller of electricity for the Commonwealth, a position to which he was co-opted.[6] This involved restricting the non-essential use of electricity to ensure the capacity for munitions production by avoiding power interruptions.This was in wartime, prior to when he and his family moved back to Melbourne in 1942 and he resumed his duties on 5 February. Moss’s technical guidance was invaluable to the Department of Munitions both in preventing shortages and expanding available capacity, as was recognised in ministerial and departmental memos.[7]

Among Moss’s other problems was the supply of electricity in South Australia, where transport difficulties had caused a shortage of coal for generating and other purposes. In 1943 he was involved, by invitation, in the planning for a major power station in Whyalla, South Australia, leading to the State Electricity Commission being formed in that State. He worked on the design of other power plants, too, including High Tension transmission and Low Tension distribution at James Bay (Tasmania), Alice Springs, and Raslin (Queensland). He advocated for an interconnected electrical grid on the Australian east coast. Another of his significant projects was his design, planning, and advice for the Snowy Mountains Hydro-electric Scheme. Ultimately his was the definitive plan for the layout of the now existing Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme.[8] In 1946 Moss was invited to be deputy leader of a technical mission to Germany and left for Europe, where he was based with the War Reparations Commission in the United Kingdom until 1948. He turned down the offer of a Knighthood saying he ‘was just doing his job.’

Standing tall at six feet, ruggedly good-looking, somewhat lanky, and acutely mentally active, Moss had a dry sense of humour that was borne out in many of his papers, notes, and lectures. He was well read and observed and wrote with an exquisite eye for detail. He published prolifically in professional engineering and trade publications as well as widely read magazines and journals. This included observations on social and historical matters, under his own name or sometimes various noms de plume. Moss’s personal interests were wide ranging. His coin collecting consumed him. He also started a collection of Indigenous artefacts, publishing an article in 1939 about items he had collected while carrying out his surveying activities, particularly stone artefacts  in the sand ridges along the Molonglo River, including the site of the provisional Parliament House.[9]  He was also an inventor, having designed an Electric Voting Machine and a self-contained under-sink water heater. He produced his own rotary conversion calculators for engineering modalities. His overseas work allowed him to follow up on his family history and trace his ancestry back to 1660.        

Moss officially retired on his return to Australia on 15 June 1948. He was not the retiring sort, however. He served as the technical advisor to the reparations commission from July 1950 to August 1951 and also acted as consultant to various electrical firms. He was involved in setting up of the Bell Bay (Tasmania) Aluminium smelter. Around 1952/53 Moss applied to become director of the Department of Industries in Ceylon (Sri Lanka).[10] The outcome of his application is unknown—the process was cut short by his sudden death due to a cerebral stroke in a Melbourne hospital on 5 January 1954. He was survived by his wife Gertrude and his five children. In December 2014 Moss was posthumously inducted into the Canberra division of the Engineering Hall of Fame. He had also been awarded Life Membership Institute of Engineers of Australia.

 References

[1] Letter John Armstrong, Minister, 8 June 1948. Author’s private collection.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.  

[4] ‘Thirty Years of Engineering’, Lecture to Institute of Engineers, 1930. Author’s private collection.

[5] Personal documents invoice, insurance for second hand vehicle, 1939. Author’s private collection.

[6] Canberra Times, 8 October 1942; Letter John Armstrong, Minister, 8 June 1948.

[7] Sir John Jensen NewsLetter 18 June 1948; Ministerial report 21 January 1943; ‘The development of Australia as an Engineering Problem’. Copies of all held in author’s private collection.

[8] Draft to Bulletin 'The Snowy Diversion' 1948; Report to Secretary, Prime Minister’s Department, 11 October 1944; lLetter John Armstrong, 8 June 1948; Speech by Sir John Jensen, reported by the editor in The Riverlander, August 1962; Sir John Jensen in Departmental Newsletter, 18 June 1948, on occasion of Moss's retirement; Report to Secretary Prime Minister’s Department, 11 October 1944 (His Ref 273/410); Report 21 January 1943 development of Australia as an Engineering Problem. Copies of all held in author’s private collection.

[9] H.P. Moss collection, National Museum of Australia.

[10] His application and references are in the National Museum of Australia, Canberra, plus a letter seeking details including age limit. His referees were Breen, Benson, Knowles, and Whitlam.