James Brindley (1716 - September 27, 1772) was an English engineer. He received little formal education but was educated at home by his mother. He was apprenticed to a millwright and soon showed exceptional skill and ability and quickly established a reputation for ingenuity at repairing many different kinds of machinery. In 1759 The Duke commissioned the construction of a canal to do just that. The resulting Bridgewater Canal, opened in 1761, is often regarded as the first British canal of the modern era, and was a major technical triumph. Brindley was commissioned as the consulting engineer. His reputation soon spread and he was soon commissioned to construct more canals. In total, throughout his life Brindley built 365 miles of canals and many watermills, including the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal the Coventry Canal, the Oxford Canal and numerous others, and he also constructed the watermill at Leek, now the Brindley Water Museum. In 1771, work had begun on the Chesterfield Canal, but e became seriously ill and returned home, where Erasmus Darwin attended him and discovered that he was suffering from diabetes. He died in 1772 at the age of 56.