Stevenson, Robert

Robert Stevenson, (born June 8, 1772, Glasgow—died July 12, 1850, Edinburgh), civil engineer who in 1797 succeeded his stepfather, Thomas Smith, as a member of the Scottish Lighthouse Board. In that capacity until 1843, he designed and built lighthouses (1797–1843) and invented intermittent and flashing lights as well as the hydrophore (an instrument for obtaining specimens from water). He wrote Account of the Bell Rock Lighthouse (1824), the famous lighthouse that he built (1807–12) in collaboration with John Rennie on an isolated site, the first such in Scotland. Three of Stevenson’s sons, Alan, David, and Thomas, were associated with him in the practice of engineering; Thomas was the father of the writer Robert Louis Stevenson.