Title: Technology & American history : a historical anthology from Technology & culture /
Authors: Cutcliffe, Stephen H.; Reynolds, Terry S.
Publisher: University of Chicago Press,
Year: 1997
Subjects: Technology United States History
Abstract: Technology and American History explores the technological dimension of American life from the birth of American industry in the late eighteenth century to the massive industrial systems of the late-twentieth century. Emphasizing a societal context for technology, this carefully-organized collection demonstrates both the manner in which cultural, political, and economic forces shape innovation, and the ways that technology has influenced society and shaped its values. Individual essays explore the importance of textile manufacturing in American industrialization, the role of the federal government in regulating new modes of transport, the development of interchangeable parts in production, the process of innovation, the notion of technological systems, and the relationship between technological change and work in the factory, on the farm, and in the home. This collection will be extremely useful for faculty and students in undergraduate survey courses in the history of American technology as well as interdisciplinary science, technology and society courses. In addition, general readers will find this collection accessible and engaging.
Contents: Technology in American context / Stephen H. Cutcliffe and Terry S. Reynolds -- Brandywine borrowings from European technology / Norman B. Wilkinson -- "Drive that branch": Samuel Slater, the power loom, and the writing of America's textile history / James L. Conrad Jr. -- Raw materials supply and technological change in the American charcoal iron industry / ichard H. Schallenberg and David A. Ault -- Bursting boilers and the federal power / John G. Burke -- Who turned the mechanical ideal into mechanical reality? / Robert B. Gordon -- From iron to steel: the recasting of the Jones and Laughlins workforce between 1885 and 1896 / David Jardini -- Technology and the market: George Eastman and the origins of mass amateur photography / Reese V. Jenkins -- A new role for professional scientists in industry: industrial research at General Electric, 1900-1916 / George Wise -- Custom design, engineering guarantees, and unpatentable data: the air conditioning industry, 1902-1935 / Gail Cooper -- "Touch someone": the telephone industry discovers sociability / Claude S. Fischer-- Farmers deskilled: hybrid corn and farmers' work / Deborah F. Gerald --- The "industrial revolution" in the home: household technology and social change in the 20th century / Ruth Schwartz Cowan -- Research, engineering, and science in American engineering colleges, 1900-1960 / Bruce Seely -- Technology in the seamless web: "success" and "failure" in the history of the electron microscope / Gregory C. Kunkle -- Momentum shifts in the American electric utility system: catastrophic change: or no change at a