For years, liberal arts majors and their academic advisors avoided careers in technical writing, and not without good reasons. Before the advent of computer technologies, technical writing was viewed as a dull and industrial-style vocation. The tech writer was perceived as someone who had to hang around with lab-coated engineers, translating esoteric facts and figures into something meaningful. Not exactly exciting stuff. In fact, this perception of the technical writing field was not far from true.
Technical writing is basically an outgrowth of the industrial revolution.
As manufacturers began developing products and complicated processes, they found a need for people who could write documentation for those things. Many products needed documents that told the consumer how to use the item. In workplaces of all types, managers and laborers relied on documentation that explained procedures and policies. Although such documents were sorely needed, the technical writer was often seen as a necessary evil, and the position did not carry much prestige. For that reason, technical writers did not always come from liberal arts backgrounds.