Technology & Engineering Books

In an inventive tour de force that seldom, if ever, has been equalled for its brilliance and far-reaching consequences, James Watt radically altered the steam engine not only by adding a separate condenser but by creating a whole new family of linkages. His approach was largely empirical, as we use the word today. This study suggests that, despite the glamor of today's sophisticated methods of... more...

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PREFACE To a good many of us the inventor is the true hero for he multiplies the working value of life. He performs an old task with new economy, as when he devises a mowing-machine to oust the scythe; or he creates a service wholly new, as when he bids a landscape depict itself on a photographic plate. He, and his twin brother, the discoverer, have eyes to read a lesson that Nature has held for ages... more...

Robert Fulton. This story is about a giant. Do you believe in them? He peeps out of your coffee cup in the morning. He cheers you upon a cold day in winter. But the boys and girls were not so well acquainted with him a hundred years ago. About that long ago, far to the north and east, a queer boy lived. He sat in his grandmother's kitchen many an hour, watching the tea-kettle. He seemed to be... more...

CHAPTER I. EVOLUTION OF TWO-SURFACE FLYING MACHINE. By Octave Chanute. I am asked to set forth the development of the "two-surface" type of flying machine which is now used with modifications by Wright Brothers, Farman, Delagrange, Herring and others. This type originated with Mr. F. H. Wenham, who patented it in England in 1866 (No. 1571), taking out provisional papers only. In the abridgment... more...

Agriculture in Virginia, 1607-1699 Various events in the latter years of the sixteenth century did much to shape the future destiny of the English nation. With the destruction of the Spanish Armada in 1588, England rose from a minor position in world affairs to one of major importance. One of the first changes was reflected in her attitude towards trade and commerce. England was no longer penned up on... more...

Chapter I. INTRODUCTION. In the last three hundred years there have been many questions of general interest before the American people. It is doubtful, however, if there is another problem, which is as warmly debated to-day as ever and whose solution is yet so uncertain, as that of the Negro. In the second decade of the seventeenth century protests were being filed against black slavery, but the system... more...

ANNOUNCER In the year 1661 Connecticut received from the hand of Charles the Second a very liberal charter granting to the people of the colony almost complete self-government and to the colony an enormous stretch of territory extending westward to the Pacific Ocean. For fifteen years the colony prospered under the generous charter. Then in 1676 trouble arose with the Governor of New York, Sir Edmund... more...

I COMMUNICATION AMONG THE ANCIENTS     Signaling the Fall of Troy—Marine Signaling among the    Argonauts—Couriers of the Greeks, Romans, and    Aztecs—Sound-signaling—Stentorophonic Tube—The Shouting    Sentinels—The Clepsydra—Signal Columns—Indian Fire and Smoke    Signals. It was very early in the history of the world that man began to feel the urgent need of... more...

INTRODUCTION Since the earliest communities of human beings first struggled for supremacy and protection, the principles of warfare have remained unchanged. New methods have been evolved and adopted with the progress of science, but no discovery, save perhaps that of gunpowder, has done so much in so short a time to revolutionize the conduct of war as aviation, the youngest, yet destined perhaps to be... more...