Verney Pickles, electrical engineer, grew up in Sowerby
Bridge, Yorkshire. He received his engineering education at Halifax Technical
College and Armstrong College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and his practical training
with Pollitt and Wigzell of Sowerby Bridge. In 1905 he joined the
Newcastle-upon-Tyne Electric Supply Company as a junior engineer and during the
next five years held various positions in the company's System Operation,
Generation, and Research Departments. He came to South Africa in 1910 to take
up an appointment as system control engineer with the Victoria Falls and
Transvaal Power Company and subsequently served the company as station
superintendent, system engineer, and deputy chief engineer. In 1937 he was
promoted to chief engineer, a position he held until his retirement in 1948.
During his years with the company it expanded from its original two power stations
to one of the major power supply organisations in the world, with seven large
power stations.
Pickles was an outstanding electrical and mechanical
engineer and was mainly concerned with the design of the company's power
stations, the electrical and mechanical layout of the generating system, and
the adaptation of the steam-generating plant to low grade coal, but in later
years was concerned also with the administration of the company. He delivered a
number of papers before the South African Institute of Electrical Engineers,
which were published in its Transactions.
Among these were: 'Rosherville power station; a brief description of the plant'
(1914), 'Notes on generating station reports' (1916), 'Turbine house plant
operation, with special reference to the Rand Power Company plants' (with T.G.
Otley, 1918), 'Notes on development in power station practice' (1928), and 'Klip
generating station; a general description and some comments on operation' (with
J.S. Trelease, 1940).
Pickles became a member of the South African Institute of
Electrical Engineers in 1911, served as president for 1926, and was elected an
honorary member in 1948. During 1939-1940 he was president of the South African
Institution of Engineers. He furthermore was awarded the gold medal of both
these bodies. In 1923 he was elected a member of the (British) Institution of
Electrical Engineers. He served on its Transvaal Committee from 1937 to 1951 (as
chairman from 1944 to 1947), and from 1945 to 1947 was the overseas
representative of the Institution's council in the Transvaal. He married Alice Isabel Clara Denny in December 1915.
