Paulin Talabot, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

Paulin Talabot

French politician and engineer

Date of Birth: 18-Aug-1799

Place of Birth: Limoges, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France

Date of Death: 21-Mar-1885

Profession: engineer, politician, entrepreneur

Nationality: France

Zodiac Sign: Leo

Paulin Talabot (18 August 1799 – 21 March 1885) was a French railway and canal engineer.
Educated at the École Polytechnique, Talabot started his career building canals.
Inspired by George and Robert Stephenson's steam railways in England, he built a line to transport coal from the coal mines at La Grand-Combe to the Mediterranean at Nîmes, which opened in 1839.
He visited England and became friends with Robert Stephenson, with whom he surveyed a route for a Suez Canal in 1847. The French Revolution of 1848 was followed by a financial crisis, and Talabot formed a company in 1852 to take over the struggling railway between Lyon and the Mediterranean; this merged with the Paris to Lyon Railway in 1857 to become the Chemins de fer de Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée.
In 1862 Talabot became its first Director General and he died on 21 March 1885.