Place Name
Industrial heritage. After Sir Hiram Maxim (February 5, 1840 – November 24, 1916), a famous local inventor best known as the creator of the first portable fully automatic machine gun, the Maxim gun. But he also held patents on numerous mechanical devices such as hair-curling irons, a mousetrap, and steam pumps. He was born in the United States but moved to England at the age of 41, becoming a naturalised British subject in 1899. Maxim founded an arms company with financial backing from Edward Vickers to produce his machine gun in Crayford, Kent, which later merged with Nordenfelt. There are two Maxim Roads in the London Borough of Bexley, this one in Erith and the other in Crayford (DA1).
