By Professor R. H. THURSTON.
The writer has often been asked by correspondents interested in
the matter of technical and trade education to outline a course of
instruction in mechanical engineering, such as would represent his
idea of a tolerably complete system of preparation for entrance into
practice. The synopsis given at the end of this article was prepared
in the spring of 1871, when the writer was on duty at the U.S. Naval
Academy, as Assistant Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy,
and, being printed, was submitted to nearly all of the then leading
mechanical engineers of the United States, for criticism, and with a
request that they would suggest such alterations and improvements as
might seem to them best. The result was general approval of the course,
substantially as here written. This outline was soon after proposed as a
basis for the course of instruction adopted at the Stevens Institute of
Technology, at Hoboken, to which institution the writer was at about
that time called. He takes pleasure in accepting a suggestion that its
publication in the SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN would be of some advantage to
many who are interested in the subject.
The course here sketched, as will be evident on examination, includes
not only the usual preparatory studies pursued in schools of mechanical
engineering, but also advanced courses, such as can only be taught in
special schools, and only there when an unusual amount of time can be
given to the professional branches, or when post graduate courses can be
given supplementary to the general course. The complete course, as here
planned, is not taught in any existing school, so far as the writer is
aware. In his own lecture room the principal subjects, and especially
those of the first part of the work, are presented with tolerable
thoroughness; but many of the less essential portions are necessarily
greatly abridged. As time can be found for the extension of the course,
and as students come forward better prepared for their work, the earlier
part of the subject is more and more completely developed, and the
advanced portions are taken up in greater and greater detail, each year
giving opportunity to advance beyond the limits set during the preceding
year.
Some parts of this scheme are evidently introductory to advanced courses
of study which are to be taken up by specialists, each one being adapted
to the special instruction of a class of students who, while pursuing
it, do not usually take up the other and parallel courses. Thus, a
course of instruction in Railroad Engineering, a course in Marine
Engineering, or a course of study in the engineering of textile
manufactures, may be arranged to follow the general course, and the
student will enter upon one or another of these advanced courses as his
talents, interests, or personal inclinations may dictate. At the Stevens
Institute of Technology, two such courses--Electrical and Marine
Engineering--are now organized as supplementary of the general course,
and are pursued by all students taking the degree of Mechanical
Engineer. These courses, as there given, however, are not fairly
representative of the idea of the writer, as above expressed, since the
time available in general course is far too limited to permit them to be
developed beyond the elements, or to be made, in the true sense of the
term, advanced professional courses. Such advanced courses as the writer
has proposed must be far more extended, and should occupy the whole
attention of the student for the time. Such courses should be given in
separate departments under the direction of a General Director of the
professional courses, who should be competent to determine the extent of
each, and to prevent the encroachment of the one upon another; but they
should each be under the immediate charge of a specialist capable
of giving instruction in the branch assigned to him, in both the
theoretical and purely scientific, and the practical and constructive
sides of the work. Every such school should be organized in such a
manner that one mind, familiar with the theory and the practice of the
professional branches taught, should be charged with the duty of giving
general direction to the policy of the institution and of directing
the several lines of work confided to specialists in the different
departments. It is only by careful and complete organization in this, as
in every business, that the best work can be done at least expense in
time and capital.
In this course of instruction in Mechanical Engineering it will be
observed that the writer has incorporated the scheme of a workshop
course. This is done, not at all with the idea that a school of
mechanical engineering is to be regarded as a "trade school," but that
every engineer should have some acquaintance with the tools and the
methods of work upon which the success of his own work is so largely
dependent. If the mechanical engineer can acquire such knowledge in the
more complete course of instruction of the trade school, either before
or after his attendance at the technical school, it will be greatly to
his advantage. The technical school has, however, a distinct field; and
its province is not to be confounded with that of the trade school.
The former is devoted to instruction in the theory and practice of a
profession which calls for service upon the men from the latter--which
makes demand upon a hundred trades--in the prosecution of its designs.
The latter teaches, simply, the practical methods of either of the
trades subsidiary to the several branches of engineering, with only so
much of science as is essential to the intelligent use of the tools and
the successful application of the methods of work of the trade taught.
The distinction between the two departments of education, both of which
are of comparatively modern date, is not always appreciated in the
United States, although always observed in those countries of Europe
in which technical and trade education have been longest pursued as
essential branches of popular instruction. Throughout France and
Germany, every large town has its trade schools, in which the trades
most generally pursued in the place are systematically taught; and every
large city has its technical school, in which the several professions
allied to engineering are studied with special development of those to
which the conditions prevailing at the place give most prominence and
local importance.
A course of trade instruction, as the writer would organize it, would
consist, first, in the teaching of the apprentice the use of the tools
of his trade, the nature of its materials, and the construction and
operation of the machinery employed in its prosecution. He would next be
taught how to shape the simpler geometrical forms in the materials of
his trade, getting out a straight prism, a cylinder, a pyramid, or a
sphere, of such size and form as may be convenient; getting lines and
planes at right angles, or working to miter; practicing the working of
his "job" to definite size, and to the forms given by drawings, which
drawings should be made by the apprentice himself. When he is able to
do good work of this kind, he should attempt larger work, and the
construction of parts of structures involving exact fitting and special
manipulations. The course, finally, should conclude with exercises in
the construction and erection of complete structures and in the making
of peculiar details, such as are regarded by the average workman
as remarkable "_tours de force_." The trade school usually gives
instruction in the common school branches of education, and especially
in drawing, free-hand and mechanical, carrying them as far as the
successful prosecution of the trade requires. The higher mathematics,
and advanced courses in physics and chemistry, always taught in schools
of engineering, are not taught in the trade school, as a rule; although
introduced into those larger schools of this class in which the aim is
to train managers and proprietors, as well as workmen. This is done in
many European schools.
As is seen above, the course of instruction in mechanical engineering
includes some trade education. The engineer is dependent upon the
machinist, the founder, the patternmaker, and other workers at the
trades, for the proper construction of the machinery and structures
designed by him. He is himself, in so far as he is an engineer, a
designer of constructions, not a constructor. He often combines,
however, the functions of the engineer, the builder, the manufacturer,
and the dealer, in his own person. No man can carry on, successfully,
any business in which he is not at home in every detail, and in which he
cannot instruct every subordinate, and cannot show every person employed
by him precisely what is wanted, and how the desired result can be best
attained. The engineer must, therefore, learn, as soon and as thoroughly
as possible, enough of the details of every art and trade, subsidiary
to his own department of engineering, to enable him to direct, with
intelligence and confidence, every operation that contributes to the
success of his work. The school of engineering should therefore be so
organized that the young engineer may be taught the elements of every
trade which is likely to find important application in his professional
work. It cannot be expected that time can be given him to make himself
an expert workman, or to acquire the special knowledge of details and
the thousand and one useful devices which are an important part of the
stock in trade of the skilled workman; but he may very quickly learn
enough to facilitate his own work greatly, and to enable him to learn
still more, with rapidity and ease, during his later professional life.
He must also, usually, learn the essential elements and principles of
each of several trades, and must study their relations to his work, and
the limitations of his methods of design and construction which they
always, to a greater or less extent, cause by their own practical or
economical limitations. He will find that his designs, his methods of
construction, and of fitting up and erecting, must always be planned
with an intelligent regard to the exigencies of the shop, as well as to
the aspect of the commercial side of every operation. This extension of
trade education for the engineer into several trades, instead of its
restriction to a single trade, as is the case in the regular trade
school, still further limits the range of his instruction in each. With
unusual talent for manipulation, he may acquire considerable knowledge
of all the subsidiary trades in a wonderfully short space of time, if he
is carefully handled by his instructors, who must evidently be experts,
each in his own trade. Even the average man who goes into such schools,
following his natural bent, may do well in the shop course, under good
arrangements as to time and character of instruction. If a man has not a
natural inclination for the business, and a natural aptitude for it, he
will make a great mistake if he goes into such a school with the hope of
doing creditable work, or of later attaining any desirable position in
the profession.
The course of instruction, at the Stevens Institute of Technology,
includes instruction in the trades to the extent above indicated. The
original plan, as given below, included such a course of trade education
for the engineer; but it was not at once introduced. The funds
available from an endowment fund crippled by the levying of an enormous
"succession tax" by the United States government and by the cost of
needed apparatus and of unanticipated expenses, in buildings and in
organization, were insufficient to permit the complete organization
of this department. A few tools were gathered together; but skilled
mechanics could not be employed to take up the work of instruction in
the several courses. Little could therefore be done for several years in
this direction. In 1875 the writer organized a "mechanical laboratory,"
with the purpose of attaining several very important objects: the
prosecution of scientific research in the various departments of
engineering work; the creation of an organization that should give
students an opportunity to learn the methods of research most usefully
employed in such investigations; the assistance of members of the
profession, and business organizations in the attempt to solve such
questions, involving scientific research, as are continually arising in
the course of business; the employment of students who had done
good work in their college course, when they so desire, in work of
investigation with a view to giving them such knowledge of this peculiar
line of work as should make them capable of directing such operations
elsewhere; and finally, but not least important of all, to secure, by
earning money in commercial work of this kind, the funds needed to carry
on those departments of the course in engineering that had been, up
to that time, less thoroughly organized than seemed desirable. This
"laboratory" was organized in 1875, the funds needed being obtained
by drawing upon loans offered by friends of the movement and by the
"Director."
It was not until the year 1878, therefore, that it became possible to
attempt the organization of the shop course; and it was then only by the
writer assuming personal responsibility for its expenses that the plan
could be entered upon. As then organized--in the autumn of 1878--a
superintendent of the workshop had general direction of the trade
department of the school. He was instructed to submit to the writer
plans, in detail, for a regular course of shop instruction, and was
given as assistants a skilled mechanic of unusual experience and
ability, whose compensation was paid from the mechanical laboratory
funds, and guaranteed by the writer personally, and another aid whose
services were paid for partly by the Institute and partly as above. The
pay of the superintendent was similarly assured. This scheme had been
barely entered upon when the illness of the writer compelled him to
temporarily give up his work, and the direction of the new organization
fell into other hands, although the department was carried on, as above,
for a year or more after this event occurred.
The plan did not fall through; the course of instruction was
incorporated into the college course, and its success was finally
assured by the growth of the school and a corresponding growth of its
income, and, especially, by the liberality of President Morton, who met
expenses to the amount of many thousands of dollars by drawing upon his
own bank account. The department was by him completely organized, with
an energetic head, and needed support was given in funds and by a force
of skilled instructors. This school is now in successful operation.
This course now also includes the systematic instruction of students in
experimental work, and the objects sought by the writer in the creation
of a "mechanical laboratory" are thus more fully attained than they
could have possibly been otherwise. It is to be hoped that, at
some future time, when the splendid bequest of Mr. Stevens may be
supplemented by gifts from other equally philanthropic and intelligent
friends of technical education, among the alumni of the school and
others, this germ of a trade school maybe developed into a complete
institution for instruction in the arts and trades of engineering, and
may thus be rendered vastly more useful by meeting the great want, in
this locality, of a real trade school, as well as fill the requirements
of the establishment of which it forms a part, by giving such trade
education as the engineer needs and can get time to acquire.
The establishment of advanced courses of special instruction in
the principal branches of mechanical engineering may, if properly
"dovetailed" into the organization, be made a means of somewhat
relieving the pressure that must be expected to be felt in the attempt
to carry out such a course as is outlined below. The post-graduate
or other special departments of instruction, in which, for example,
railroad engineering, marine engineering, and the engineering of cotton,
woolen, or silk manufactures, are to be taught, may be so organized that
some of the lectures of the general course may be transferred to them,
and the instructors in the latter course thus relieved, while the
subjects so taught, being treated by specialists, may be developed more
efficiently and more economically.
Outlines of these advanced courses, as well as of the courses in trade
instruction comprehended in the full scheme of mechanical engineering
courses laid out by the writer a dozen years ago, and as since recast,
might be here given, but their presentation would occupy too much space,
and they are for the present omitted.
The course of instruction in this branch of engineering, at the Stevens
Institute of Technology, is supplemented by "Inspection Tours," which
are undertaken by the graduating class toward the close of the last
year, under the guidance of their instructors, in which expeditions they
make the round of the leading shops in the country, within a radius of
several hundred miles, often, and thus get an idea of what is meant by
real business, and obtain some notion of the extent of the field of work
into which they are about to enter, as well as of the importance of
that work and the standing of their profession among the others of the
learned professions with which that of engineering has now come to be
classed.
At the close of the course of instruction, as originally proposed, and
as now carried out, the student prepares a "graduating thesis," in which
he is expected to show good evidence that he has profited well by the
opportunities which have been given him to secure a good professional
education. These theses are papers of, usually, considerable extent, and
are written upon subjects chosen by the student himself, either with or
without consultation with the instructor. The most valuable of
these productions are those which present the results of original
investigations of problems arising in practice or scientific research
in lines bearing upon the work of the engineer. In many cases, the
work thus done has been found to be of very great value, supplying
information greatly needed in certain departments, and which had
previously been entirely wanting, or only partially and unsatisfactorily
given by authorities. Other theses of great value present a systematic
outline of existing knowledge of some subject which had never before
been brought into useful form, or made in any way accessible to the
practitioner. In nearly all cases, the student is led to make the
investigation by the bent of his own mind, or by the desire to do work
that may be of service to him in the practice of his profession. All
theses are expected to be made complete and satisfactory to the head
of department of Engineering before his signature is appended to the
diploma which is finally issued to the graduating student. These
preliminaries being completed, and the examinations having been reported
as in all respects satisfactory, the degree of Mechanical Engineer is
conferred upon the aspirant, and he is thus formally inducted into the
ranks of the profession.