stackyFACTSModernizing Japan’s treacherous coastlines required a stubborn Scotsman and a blatant disregard for traditional engineering.
Modernizing Japan’s treacherous coastlines required a stubborn Scotsman and a blatant disregard for traditional engineering. During the Meiji Restoration, Richard Henry Brunton was imported to build Western-style lighthouses. Realizing Japan’s violent earthquakes would instantly shatter rigid European stone towers, he radically innovated, designing flexible, shock-absorbing lighthouse foundations that survived centuries of relentless seismic devastation.
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