Our family home in Chattanooga was built in 1941, and like most other homes in the city was heated by coal. It had a coal bin in the basement, and a big galvanized furnace with cast iron doors and grates and air ducts sprouting from the top like the hair of Medusa.
Articles with Engineering
Chet at his father's workbench, 1951 • © Raymo Family Archive
Photo by Kevin Kandlbinder on Unsplash
Intelligent design happens naturally
What a jumble! I’m sitting in a doctor’s examining room waiting for a checkup. On the wall is a poster chart of the human digestive system. The first thing I’m reminded of is my sock and underwear drawer.
Fontana Dam, North Carolina • Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (Public Domain)
Industrial age artifacts need not be eyesores
In the autumn of 1728, Samuel Johnson, future author of the famous dictionary, rode with his father from his birthplace at Lichfield in the English Midlands to the university town of Oxford. He was 19 years old.
Illustration from "Popular Mechanics," 1947
On the cutting edge of gimmickry
Recently, in a fit of nostalgia, I purchased copies of “Popular Science” and “Popular Mechanics” from the newsstand.
Eastern Colorado Great Plains • Photo by Ken Lund (CC BY-SA 2.0)
The square root of our plumb-bobbing obsession
Here is a little lesson about the best and worst of western civilization. It can be summarized in one word: Square.
Photo by Jaime Spaniol on Unsplash
Going against the grain
Independence Day. The sand-castle season begins.
The ancient Tunnel of Eupalinos • Photo by Tomisti (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Making ends meet
In chalky rock beneath the English Channel, British and French tunneling machines are burrowing toward each other, like moles, from opposite shores.
The TI-36 Solar pocket calculator • Photo by Juhox (CC BY-SA 3.0)
An alternative Top 10
The National Academy of Engineering has announced the ten greatest engineering achievements of the past 25 years. To draw public attention to the excitement of engineering, the Academy sorted through 340 possibilities and chose the following:
Professor Butts and the Self-Operating Napkin (1931)
Goldberg had answer
Lots of stories in the news lately about the perils of mega-technology.
Chromolithograph of the “Great East River Suspension Bridge,” 1883 • Currier and Ives (Public Domain)
Gods no longer
New York’s bridges are falling down. According to a report in the “New York Times,” about a third of the city’s two thousand bridges are considered to be structurally deficient.