History in Engineering

Engineering is where human knowledge meets real-world problems—and solves them. It's the source of some of our greatest inventions, from the catapult to the jet engine. Marshall Brain, creator of the How Stuff Works series and a professor at the Engineering Entrepreneurs Program at NCSU, provides a detailed look at 250 milestones in the discipline.

A Social History of Engineering shows how social and economic conditions in each age have precipitated advances in engineering. There are, in short, economic, political, and philosophical implications in changing technologies. While the book begins with the Stone Age, the Greeks, and the Romans, the bulk of the volume concentrates on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

This innovative new book presents the vast historical sweep of engineering innovation and technological change to describe and illustrate engineering design and what conditions, events, cultural climates and personalities have brought it to its present state.