Preface
This book stems from a career-long interest in understanding how
structural engineers worked in the past. Although we admire the great
works of Roman engineering and the medieval cathedrals of Europe,
we tend to think that modern engineering is somehow superior to the
engineering that produced these structures. The premise of this book
is that, for all its evident differences, modern engineering cannot claim
superiority to the engineering of any period in the history of civilization.
That contemporary engineering is based on a different mindset
and a different set of values from the work of any of these other periods
is evident. But the works that appeared in the engineering of other
periods are not reproducible by contemporary methodology: each
age defines its own artifacts and its own ways of producing these
artifacts.
The late nineteenth century is a particularly significant time
for understanding contemporary engineering: Although nineteenthcentury
engineering is different from modern engineering in the sense
described, this period is closely related to the present time. Although
Roman and medieval engineering are defined primarily by experiencebased
procedures, they are somewhat informed by emerging ideas from
speculative science. By the nineteenth century, however, ideas of science
were sufficiently advanced, and ideas about the role of science in
society, such as positivism, were sufficiently widespread that engineers
began to think of themselves as scientists of a sort and began to think
that they were responsible for applying scientific procedures to constructed
works.
A particularly interesting feature that emerged from the study
of nineteenth-century engineering methods was the efficiency and accuracy of some of the procedures employed, as compared with the way we accomplish
these tasks in the present age. Particularly in truss design, both analytical and graphical,
most of the procedures employed in the nineteenth century appear to be more efficient than
those that we teach to students in contemporary engineering programs. The reliance on
graphical methods, especially for trusses and arches, is particularly revealing of the late
nineteenth-century mindset and does influence the actual form of the structures.
In preparing this book I tried to focus on ordinary procedures used to design and
construct ordinary works without placing emphasis on the exceptional engineering works
that mark this period. Thus, although the reader can find references to the design of major
works, most of the discussions in this book describe smaller works and the significant body
of engineering design that went into their construction.
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Acknowledgments
I have been assisted greatly in many ways by many people in the
preparation of this book. I have received particular assistance from
several libraries that I would like to acknowledge. Daniel Lewis at the
Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, has been particularly helpful, as
have all the staff at the Avery Library at Columbia University, Ilhan
Citak at the Linderman Library at Lehigh University, and the Special
Collections staff at the Penn State University Libraries. I would like to
acknowledge the assistance I have received from the staff at ASCE
Press, particularly from Betsy Kulamer, Donna Dickert, and Sharada
Gilkey. I note the editorial assistance I have received from Mary Byers
and from my brother, Daniel Boothby. I am also grateful for the
support and assistance I have received from my colleagues, notably
Jeffrey Laman, Louis Geschwindner Jr., Harry West, and Theodore
Galambos. I am very grateful to Brice Ohl and Oluwatobi Jewoola,
undergraduate students at Penn State University, for the preparation
of the illustrations found throughout the book. I have received continual
help and encouragement from my friends at the Engineering
Copy Center, Penn State University. Finally, I gratefully acknowledge
the patience, comfort, and help of my wife, Anne Trout, over the four
years during which this book was developed.
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