John Crosfield

Who was John Crosfield?

John Fothergill Crosfield CBE DSc MA, inventor and entrepreneur, was a pioneer in the application of electronics to all aspects of colour printing and the inventor of the acoustic and subsonic mines during the Second World War.

Graduating with a degree in mechanical sciences from Cambridge University in 1936, Crosfield was working on electrical lifts for ASEA in Sweden when war was declared. He joined the Admiralty, where with a team of mathematicians and engineers he was charged with developing sonar, to detect midget submarines, and new types of mines.

In 1947, Crosfield founded J F Crosfield Ltd. to develop press control equipment, beginning with the Autotron, that enabled magazines to print economically in colour. Following this the company played a leading role in the introduction of colour scanning in 1958, phototypesetting and later the automated composition of pages incorporating pictures and text, a 1970s precursor to Photoshop. He founded Crosfield Business Machines Ltd in 1966 to develop and produce banknote inspection, counting and sorting machines. The companies won 4 Queens Awards for Technology and Exports. De La Rue acquired the Crosfield businesses in 1975.