The Contractors : ICE Publishing : 9780727758309 : 09 Dec 2013 : Fully illustrated in colour,The Contractors, is the first history of the challenges and adventures faced by British civil engineering contractors from their emergence with canal construction in the late-eighteenth century to the present day. Extraordinarily ambitious, largely unrecognised men who built the world's infrastructure ? its roads and railways, canals and bridges, docks and harbours, lighthouses and breakwaters, sea works and flood defences, water supply and irrigation, urban drainage and sewerage, gas works and power stations, and buildings of all shapes and sizes ? these contractors took considerable risks, many failed in the process but others thrived and developed into some of the most powerful and influential industrialists of their day. Including profiles of many of the key figures and organisations in the industry through the ages,The Contractors explains what the business is about and where it comes fro