65 
 >py 1 
 
 ENGINEERING EDUCATION 
 
 BY 
 
 B. A. BEHREND 
 
 The greai end of life is noi kno<wledge 
 but action guided by knoivledge, 
 
 .^ — Thomas Henry Huxley. 
 
ENGINEERING EDUCATION 
 
 BY 
 
 B. A. BEHREND 
 
 The grea.{ end of life is not kno<wledge 
 but action guided by knoivledge. 
 
 — Thomas Henry Huxley. 
 
4 Ap'O? 
 
 ^ / 
 
 
WITH 
 
 HIS KIND PERMISSION 
 
 I INSCRIBE THIS PAPER 
 TO 
 AMERICA'S GREAT EDUCATOR^ 
 
 ANDREW DICKSON WHITE 
 
 WITH DEEPEST REVERENCE 
 AND RESPECT 
 
PREFACE 
 
 When a man engaged in the absorbing duties of a responsible posi- 
 tion, preoccupied with problems of an essentially practical nature, writes 
 an essay on education he incurs the risk of criticism from various 
 sources. So much has been said and written on the subject that, had it 
 not been for so kind an invitation as I received from the editor of one 
 of the most widely read engineering magazines in the world, I should 
 never have had the presumption to write this paper. However, I ac- 
 cepted the invitation, as it gave me an opportunity to say some of the 
 things that I deemed w^orth bringing out, and which I had not seen before 
 expressed in other essays on the subject. 
 
 Since the publication of this paper I have heard much comment 
 upon it, and some parts of it have been most willfully misunderstood. 
 To me the scientific engineer should be a missionary of the highest 
 order, ^ot, indeed, the kind of missionary which has justly come into 
 disrepute through its presumption and arrogance ; but the kind which 
 teaches and labors faithfully towards the accomplishment of high aims. 
 Think of the great field of sanitary engineering, of the improvement 
 in our cities of the water supply which, to-day, is a veritable Minotaur 
 to which tens of thousands are annually being sacrificed through 
 typhoid and other enteric diseases, owing to the darkness and ignorance 
 befogging the minds of the people and the city councils ; think of the 
 vast improvements in transportation, in lighting, and heating which 
 can be, and are being, effected by scientific engineering. At the foun- 
 dation of such great work lies the singleness of purpose of men devoted 
 to their work. 
 
 When I say that the engineering teachers must be men of a wide 
 range of practical experience, I do not mean men who have done little 
 original scientific engineering and who have been successful, under 
 the guise of engineers, ' as contractors, agents, and experts. Such men 
 would merely use the dignity of their chairs as a means for obtaining 
 business. If the alternative lies between such men and the conscientious 
 teacher of limited experience, I most emphatically prefer the latter. 
 The occupant of a chair of engineering must love his teaching work, 
 and devote to it careful thought and time. In writing these lines I 
 am reminded of a man whose name I may not write without deploring 
 his untimely death ; a man who preeminently fulfilled the requirements 
 of the ideal engineering teacher ; whose life and work must silence 
 those who believe that such men as I would like to see as teachers cannot 
 be found ; I have in mind John Butler Johnson, the late dean of the 
 Engineering School of the University of Wisconsin. Honor to his 
 memory ! 
 
Let it not be said that the men of action have not mostly been 
 men of learning and culture. Among great diplomats, the recent 
 appointment of James Bryce, a scholar, as British Ambassador, is but 
 another proof of the rising belief that action should be guided by 
 knowledge; James Russell Lowell, George Bancroft, and Andrew 
 Dickson White are other examples of great scholars who have done 
 imperishable work. Bismarck, Beaconsiield, Salisbury, and Gladstone 
 all were men of action and wide learning, though not, to be sure, pos- 
 sessed of a futile knowledge and culture which is often mistaken for 
 the true knowledge which guides and inspires. 
 
 Criticism has been made, though perhaps from irresponsible 
 sources, that I laid too much emphasis upon the necessity of good and 
 honest engineering. It has been said that there is some material dif- 
 ference between the engineering required in battleships and in electric 
 motors, steam engines, cranes, and other mechanical apparatus. It 
 would seem unnecessary to controvert such criticism. A recent accident 
 forcibly impressed upon me the viciousness of such criticism. In the 
 pouring of a sixty-ton casting the steel ropes of a crane handling a 
 ladle filled with hot iron suddenly gave way, precipitating the ladle 
 upon the foundry floor. Had it not been that the bucket had fallen 
 into a hole in the foundry floor, which prevented its upsetting, the lives 
 of numerous bystanders would have been sacrificed, due to a carelessly 
 designed, or too closely calculated, lifting appliance. Go through the 
 list of accidents in our modern manufacturing plants, and everywhere 
 you will be impressed with the necessity of building machinery with 
 the utmost care, avoiding the use of materials which have flaws or are 
 likely to develop them. Even with the greatest care accidents from 
 machines flying apart at high speeds are only too frequent. 
 
 If portions of this paper are criticised on the ground of their being 
 too idealistic, I answer that few there are who realize as keenly as I 
 do the limits of the practicable in this direction. It is well to pitch our 
 standard slightly higher than the goal we are likely to reach. I am 
 thoroughly convinced that the theory of evolution, which I adopt in 
 all its applications to the varied fields of human knowledge, does not 
 encourage Utopian anticipations, but favors an attitude of restrained 
 interference rather than one of energetic ignorance. My views are best 
 expressed in the words of Herbert Spencer that ^Hhe man of higher type 
 must be content with greatly moderated expectations, while he perseveres 
 with undiminished efl^orts. He has to see how comparatively little can 
 be done, and yet to find it worth while to do that little: so uniting 
 philanthropic energy with philosophic calm." 
 
 South Nokwood^ Ohio, January, 1907. 
 
 6 
 
ENGINEERING EDUCATION 
 
 IT is with considerable apprehension that I have accepted an 
 invitation to contribute to the columns of the Eleotrical 
 World my views on engineering education. However, the 
 
 subject matter is one to which I have given years of careful 
 thought and one which I have learned to like for its own sake 
 as well as for its great importance and, when I here repeat the 
 editor's courteous invitation, I do so with the purpose of pre- 
 senting my credentials, as it were, for undertaking this task, 
 though I am fully aware that I lay myself open to the accusa- 
 tion of egotism in so doing. ''I feel," Mr. Weaver says, "that 
 with your knowledge of both the European and American situa- 
 tion and the broad view which you are capable of taking of any 
 subject, what you would say concerning the present status and 
 the future of the electrical engineer, would be read with utmost 
 interest by our readers. A point which I think it would be inter- 
 esting to bring out is the adequacy of the present methods of 
 electrical engineering education, pointing out any weaknesses 
 which you think exist and making suggestions as to improve- 
 ment. As a rule, the advocates of engineering education are 
 rather one-sided in their views, while critics are apt to be from 
 among those who have not given the subject any broad con- 
 sideration. You are one of the very few that we know of who 
 could review the subject thoroughly from both the scholastic 
 and practical standpoints, and we, therefore, think that such an 
 article from your pen as proposed would be a valuable contribu- 
 tion to the subject.'' 
 
 Though the editor's words may have been slightly colored 
 by ten years of friendship, which it has been my great good f or- 
 
tune to enjoy, I feel that, besides tlie great interest wliicli I have 
 always taken in the subject of education in general, my study- 
 ing in European universities, and my lecturing in some of the 
 great universities in this country and Canada, have given me a 
 good opportunity to observe. On the other hand, as chief engi- 
 neer of a large manufacturing company, I have had, for the past 
 seven years, plenty of opportunity to come into intimate contact 
 with, and to employ a large number of the graduates of Euro- 
 pean and American universities. 
 
 I will preface this article with a quotation from an address 
 on medical education which that great English biologist and 
 keenest of observers, Prof. Thomas Henry Huxley, delivered 
 some thirty-six years ago to the students in University College, 
 London, and I will take the liberty of substituting for the words 
 ** medical education,'' the words *' engineering education": 
 
 ^*I will tell you what has struck me," said Prof. Huxley, 
 ^^but in speaking in this frank way, as one always does about 
 the defects of one's friends, I must beg you to disabuse your 
 minds of the notion that I am alluding to any particular school, 
 or to any particular college, or to any particular person ; and to 
 believe that if I am silent when I should be glad to speak with 
 high praise, it is because that praise would come too close to 
 this locality. What has struck me, then, in this long experience 
 of the best men best instructed in engineering, taking it as a 
 whole, and broadly, is the singular unreality of their knowledge 
 of engineering. Now, I use that word 'unreality' advisedly: I 
 do not say ' scanty ' : on the contrary, there is plenty of it — a 
 great deal too much of it — but it is the quality, the nature of the 
 knowledge, which I quarrel with. I know I used to have a bad 
 reputation among students for setting up a very high standard 
 of acquirement, and I dare say that you may think the standard 
 of this old examiner, who happily is now very nearly an extinct 
 examiner, has been pitched too high. Nothing of the kind, I as- 
 
 8 
 
sure you. The defects I have noticed, and the faults I have to 
 find, arise entirely from the circumstance that my standard is 
 pitched too low. vThis is no paradox, but quite simply the fact. 
 The knowledge I have looked for was a real, precise, thorough, 
 and practical knowledge of fundamentals ; whereas that which 
 the best of the candidates, in a large proportion of cases, have 
 had to give me was a large, extensive, and inaccurate knowl- 
 edge of superstructure ; and that is what I mean by saying that 
 my demands went too low and not too high. ' ' 
 
 It is my opinion that these remarks apply with great force 
 and justice to the condition of engineering education of to-day. 
 I feel almost tempted to take this excerpt from Prof. Huxley's 
 lecture as a text, upon which to deliver the sermon. I also wish 
 to beg my readers to disabuse their minds that I am alluding to 
 any particular school here or abroad; I also wish to state that 
 my silence on many features which are good is due to the praise 
 coming too close to this locality; I also have been struck with the 
 singular unreality of engineering knowledge displayed by engi- 
 neering graduates, and I have been struck with a certain volu- 
 bility and prolixity of knowledge, and a want of a "real, precise, 
 thorough and practical knowledge of fundamentals." In pon- 
 dering over this state of affairs I have been impelled to acknowl- 
 edge, at least to myself, that the fact that Prof. Huxley's state: 
 ments, made to medical students thirty-six years ago, applying 
 so singularly well to engineering students of to-day, cannot be a 
 matter of mere coincidence. It would, therefore, appear as if 
 the difficulty involved is deep-seated and, perhaps, irremediable. 
 Let us look at the conditions of engineering education with as 
 little bias as possible. We are all prone to hold a brief for some 
 school or university, believing unconsciously, though perhaps 
 not admitting it, that a school to which such great luminaries a^ 
 ourselves have owed their education, must surely be a good 
 school. In considering this subject we have to consider the three 
 
 9 
 
elements which enter into education, viz., first of all the teacher, 
 secondly the student, and last and least the school. I heard 
 President Jacob Gould Schurman, of Cornell University, say 
 from the rostrum, to a great assemblage of people, upon the in- 
 troduction into office of a new president of a university, which 
 had been ridden by politics and in which almost any other con- 
 sideration, excepting that of competency, had entered into the 
 selection of teachers, that a great university was made not by the 
 board of trustees, not by the president, but by a competent fac- 
 ulty. Though this may sound to any thoughtful person like a 
 truism, yet it is a fact usually forgotten and disregarded. We 
 must have good competent teachers, and there is no doubt that 
 such good competent teachers can be obtained and that a great 
 many universities, both in Europe and in this country, already 
 possess them. 
 
 The inspiration which students obtain from great masters 
 in their professions is infinitely greater than the benefit which 
 will come to them from having studied in palatial buildings, built 
 by, and dedicated to, men who have been favored by fortune in 
 the great struggle for wealth, which well-nigh obscures to-day 
 the engineering side of industry. If I may here speak of a matter 
 thoroughly personal, I do so with the knowledge that those of 
 my readers who have had the good fortune to have been influ- 
 enced by great men, both in their studies and in their views of 
 life, will be in full accord with my remarks. The influence which 
 some of my revered teachers, as Hermann Helmholtz, Gisbert 
 Kapp, Riedler, and Slaby, have had over me ; the knowledge and 
 inspiration which have come to me from the earnest study of 
 the works of John Stuart Mill, Charles Robert Darwin, Thomas 
 Henry Huxley, and Andrew Dickson White, are the factors 
 which have counted for something in my life, and I confess that 
 I have altogether forgotten the architecture of the buildings in 
 which I have studied as well as the names of those who built 
 
 10 
 
these structures. It seems to be conimonly assumed by those 
 who have never done much scientific or engineering work them- 
 selves, that it is the building and equipment which are the essen- 
 tial features of, and the foundation for, good engineering educa- 
 tion. Poor workmen always quarrel with their tools ; poor 
 teachers naturally quarrel with their equipment. Both in Eu- 
 rope and in America there prevails a tendency to build palatial 
 universities instead of j^lain dignified structures and, as the 
 building of these expensive structures places the university un- 
 der obligation to their munificent builders, the trustees and other 
 officers connected with the school thus endowed by rich men will 
 endeavor to apologize for, if they do not countenance, the meth- 
 ods by which their patrons have acquired their wealth. Although 
 this circumstance alone would be sufficient, in the opinion of most 
 right-minded people, to carefully consider the wisdom of ac- 
 cepting endowments from individuals implying obligation on the 
 part of the university, it must further be considered that these 
 large institutions require considerable sums of money for their 
 upkeep and, therefore, funds are continually needed by them 
 which would not be forthcoming, unless the officers of these 
 institutions at least remained silent in regard to such of their 
 ideas as might offend their benefactors. 
 
 But there is another argument which I deem even more irre- 
 futable than the previous one, /. e.^ that a well equipped institu- 
 tion can much more readily get along with poor teachers than a 
 poorly equipped institution. In this connection it may not be 
 amiss to mention that some of the greatest experimental dis- 
 coveries in natural science have been made in laboratories which 
 were poorly equi23ped, even considering the time when these dis- 
 coveries were made. I have merely to mention the experimental 
 researches of Michael Faraday and the remarkable achievements 
 of Justus Liebig to make us realize that there is no proportional- 
 ity between the equipment and the discovery. Some of the great 
 
 11 
 
achievements of modern science have been made in laboratories 
 which were by no means equipped in a remarkable way. The 
 researches on electrical waves by Heinrich Hertz and the work 
 of Rutherford were carried out in laboratories which, from the 
 modern standpoint, were anything but complete in their equip- 
 ment. Again, when I think of the miserable testing department 
 at the Oerlikon Tool and Engine Works, in which Mr. C. E. L. 
 Brown did some of the finest electrical engineering work a score 
 of years ago, I state with great emphasis that I can see no pro- 
 portion whatsoever between equipment and results. Instead of 
 inciting the inventive qualities, a complete equipment keeps 
 these faculties dormant ; instead of stimulating both the teacher 
 and the student in the devising of methods for the demonstra- 
 tion of laws of nature, an air of indolence is inspired by the fact 
 that you simply have to go to a piece of apparatus to have it 
 perform for you, without effort, what can be learned only by the 
 earnest application of the mind. Thus, I am compelled to see 
 in the large endowments of universities, a blessing of a very 
 questionable nature. Philanthropy has done much good to be 
 sure ; but it seems as if for every sixpennyworth of good, it 
 does a shilling's worth of harm. 
 
 There is another disadvantage which usually follows in the 
 wake of these large endowments for buildings, viz., the fact that 
 the funds left are too small to engage competent and talented 
 men to take charge of the teaching. President Schurman's 
 statement that it is the faculty which makes the university must 
 be accepted as an axiom. It is all very well to say that teach- 
 ers should be of frugal habits and set an example of simplicity 
 to their students. This is unquestionably true and the man who 
 lived a life of luxury would probably be morally and intel- 
 lectually unfit for his position as a teacher. But it is disre- 
 garding all common sense, and also the realities of life, to ex- 
 pect to be able to obtain the services of a man qualified to in- 
 
 12 
 
struct and to direct younger men in a difficult scientific profes- 
 sion, to work away all his life upon a salary which hardly en- 
 ables him to give his children careful education and to save for 
 his old age. It has thus come to pass that men who have been 
 shipwrecked in their professions in life have sought a haven 
 in teaching but, hard though it may sound, this class of men 
 is just the class of men which should not be permitted to teach. 
 More and more, the educators of Europe begin to realize the 
 necessity of employing the highest talent obtainable in scientific 
 teaching. In medical science, for some score of years past, the 
 greatest practitioners have been chosen as teachers ; in the legal 
 profession, the foremost lawyers have been selected as teachers 
 of the law in the universities ; and, similarly, some of the most 
 eminent engineers have been called to chairs in the technical col- 
 leges, in which positions they have the opportunity of still prac- 
 ticing their profession and yet giving the younger generation 
 the benefit of their wide experience and knowledge. A step 
 in this direction very much to be admired has recently been 
 taken by Sir Oliver Lodge, Principal of the University of 
 Birmingham, in calling Mr. Gisbert Kapp to the chair of elec- 
 trical engineering. Thus the University of Birmingham has not 
 only complimented a great engineer, but it has obtained the 
 benefit of the vast experience at the disposal of Mr. Kapp. It 
 must be distinctly understood that these prominent practition- 
 ers, whether in the medical, legal, or engineering profession, 
 are not required to devote their entire time to teaching; on 
 the contrary, by so doing, they would incapacitate themselves 
 altogether for teaching. Only continual contact with actual 
 practice will wear off that unreality of which Prof. Huxley 
 complained in his medical students, and of which we complain 
 in engineering students. You cannot be a master of surgery 
 if you confine your practice to the cases in the university hos- 
 pital ; and no more can you be a competent engineer if you are 
 
 13 
 
not in close contact with engineering problems of the day all 
 over the world. 
 
 This' matter is really one upon which a great deal of thought 
 should be bestowed. The average student who goes to the uni- 
 versity to be taught, represents by no means the fair average 
 of ~ intelligence of the nation. It cannot be denied that a large 
 moiety of our young men, especially those of keen intelligence, 
 see in the avoiding of a university education a short-cut to 
 fortune. Our industries are growing more and more commer- 
 cial; the engineering work requiring real ability is done by a 
 comparatively small number of men, and the most lucrative po- 
 sitions are usually not in the engineering professions. Thus, 
 men of some ability, keen to see their own advantage, see oppor- 
 tunities ahead of them as good as those obtainable by the gradu- 
 ates of our universities. Let us see if we cannot gain some 
 light on the much controverted question of the necessity of a 
 college education by considering the history of education in 
 Europe, since more experience has been gained in this direc- 
 tion on the other side of the Atlantic than on this. Germany 
 has always been looked upon as the country of scholasticism. 
 The people have a strong proclivity to intellectual pursuits. 
 The German mind is naturally pensive, given to idealization and 
 fond of study. Thus every little town has had its university 
 for a hundred years or more, and the most respected citizens 
 are the teachers of these universities. Theology, law and medi- 
 cine, and the physical sciences are more or less peacefully 
 taught, side by side, in buildings which inspire reverence on 
 account of their antiquity, but which, in all other respects, are 
 marked for simplicity. The teachers in these universities are 
 usually earnest men, devoted to their professions and spending 
 their lives in their lecture rooms and laboratories. It is not 
 at all uncustomary to see men of three score years and ten, and 
 over, still teaching with the same enthusiasm which they evinced 
 
 14 
 
when they were young, and probably much more enthusi- 
 astic than most of our young teachers in these modern 
 days. While these men may be somewhat antiquated in their 
 methods, the inspiration which the students obtain from listen- 
 ing to these old masters is something that could not be given 
 them in any other way. Helmholtz was seventy-three years old 
 when he died and he was then still teaching; Bunsen was over 
 eighty, while he still taught at Heidelberg; Lord Kelvin only 
 recently retired from teaching, and there are a host of others 
 who have grown venerable in teaching. 
 
 The rapid and stupendous growth of the manufacturing in- 
 dustries required the training of young men in the applications 
 of physical science. The universities were not able to cope 
 with this problem. The scholastic influence which had reigned 
 in them for centuries made them look with a certain measure 
 of disdain upon the technical sciences, which seemed to stand 
 only for utilitarian ideas and material profits. Scientific re- 
 searches which used to be carried on for their own sake and 
 for the inherent interest which the investigator took in them, 
 began to be considered as unpractical and useless by the large 
 host of students and their rather imperfectly trained and edu- 
 cated teachers. Doctors of science who were unable to obtain 
 chairs at the universities would become professors in the tech- 
 nical schools. There was for a time a strong antagonism 
 between the university and the polytechnic institute which 
 was not only quite comprehensible, but also justifiable. The 
 scientific investigator knew very well that it was impossible to 
 predict the far reaching importance of a scientific investigation 
 and that, therefore, this everlasting query, '^"What's the usef 
 was indicative of the short-sightedness of the questioner. On 
 the other hand, the practical man with a smattering of science, 
 soon got the best of the argument by putting his limited knowl- 
 edge to material use. The large number of universities had al- 
 
 15 
 
ready created a class of educated men which formed something 
 like an educated proletariat, for whom it was hard to find em- 
 ployment. The universities had produced a class of men of 
 large learning but little power of application of this learning to 
 the problems of life. It has often struck me that many of these 
 learned Germans do not possess their knowledge, their knowl- 
 edge possesses them! 
 
 But in the course of time the polytechnic institutes, which 
 are very like our universities in this country, have molded 
 their institutions along the lines according to which the un- 
 versities had built up their faculties. The teaching of steam 
 engineering, of statics, or of hydraulics was no longer left to 
 men who had actually seen a steam engine once in their lives, 
 or passed a bridge, or seen a dam, but to men who had built 
 steam engines, had designed bridges, and had constructed 
 dams, just as the teaching of theology and of law and of medi- 
 cine had been entrusted to great ministers, great lawyers, and 
 great surgeons in the old universities. The old principles were 
 all right but the universities, fossilized through ages, refused 
 to apply them consistently to the new field. The polytechnic 
 institutes thus became institutions of learning in which not only 
 the science of engineering but the pure sciences, which are ap- 
 plied to engineering, found a stronghold. It did not take long to 
 discover that numerous technical problems rendered infinitely 
 better illustrations of scientific principles than the vague and 
 unreal examples which were offered by the schools to illustrate 
 the great laws of nature. Speaking with particular reference to 
 our own profession, it was readily seen that the telegraph, the 
 telephone, and the dynamo electric machine offered the most in- 
 teresting and instructive examples of the theories of electro- 
 magnetic induction of Faraday and Maxwell. I believe I am 
 right in stating that, without these applications, a general ac- 
 ceptance of these theories would have been very much longer 
 
 16 
 
delayed. The mathematical theories of Fourier found beautiful 
 illustrations in electric phenomena, and reality was given to 
 mathematical speculations which appeared almost like phantas- 
 magoria without these illustrations. 
 
 Despite the inroad of '^ commercialism" into engineering, 
 there never has been such opportunity for the application of 
 engineering ability as there is to-day. It is quite true that 
 many manufacturing concerns, especially those which are fa- 
 vored by a monopoly, have come to see that they can make large 
 profits in adhering to developed lines of apparatus and in ad- 
 mitting as few changes and improvements to be made on this 
 apparatus as is compatible with large sales. This tendency 
 is surely feasible but it is not likely to be permanent, as the 
 concerns in which such disregard for continuous progress is 
 carried into effect will sooner or later, go to the wall. To 
 illustrate the point I have in mind, take a concern which em- 
 ployed a capable engineer at one time who developed a line of 
 electric motors. A short-sighted policy would consider the 
 manufacture of this line of apparatus to the exclusion of im- 
 provements the most successful way to make money. This 
 policy would enable the abolition of a designing department 
 and the organization would consist of a factory and a sales 
 department. For some years business would be satisfactory, 
 until such time as improvements had been made by less retro- 
 gressive concerns, when it would have become impossible to sell 
 the old and unimproved machines. We frequently see illus- 
 trations of this policy of concerns enjoying at one time a great 
 reputation, but suddenly losing their business prestige on ac- 
 count of their lack of progressiveness. The successful manu- 
 facturing concern must provide for continual improvement of 
 its apparatus and, for this purpose, part of the profits obtained 
 from the manufacture of standard apparatus must be used. 
 
 There has been a great deal of foolish talk on the subject 
 
 17 
 
of ^^ commercial engineering." We hear every day men, thor- 
 oughly incompetent to discuss such matters, glibly labeling 
 engineers ^^ scientific engineers" and '^ commercial engineers." 
 It is difficult to know what is meant by either of these ex- 
 pressions. The work of the engineer should consist in the 
 careful designing and building of apparatus so that it per- 
 forms its functions safely and with the least possible waste 
 of both material and power. Machinery designed by such an 
 engineer is machinery which is designed scientifically, and it 
 is machinery which the salesman will have little difficulty in 
 disposing of. I am sure that this must be what some people 
 mean by calling an engineer a ''commercial engineer." But be 
 it always remembered that such successful engineering is 
 strictly the function of the scientific engineer. Careful and 
 honest engineering is always ''commercial" and, although poor- 
 ly and dishonestly designed and manufactured machinery may 
 yet be successfully sold for a time by an acute salesman, such 
 condition cannot last. I believe that, in this commercial age, 
 we cannot put too much emphasis upon the necessity of the 
 engineer being a bulwark against the continual onslaught of 
 the commercial man for the sake of cheaper and, therefore, 
 poorer machinery. It is a menace to the industry of a coun- 
 try to see engineering quality disregarded and to have machines 
 selected according to price rather than according to quality. 
 Imagine the equipment of a man-of-war to be made in the cheap- 
 est possible manner! Imagine the guns and firearms to be 
 beautifully polished and not made of good material! Imagine 
 the high speed steam turbines and electric generators to be de- 
 signed poorly and to be made of poor material and workman- 
 ship ! And yet these are exactly the conditions which would be 
 brought about if the engineer permitted the inroad of ' ' commer- 
 cialism" into his profession. 
 
 This brings me to another point. The necessity of the en- 
 
 18 
 
gineer possessing a strong and determined character which en- 
 ables him to brush aside the opinions of those who lack the 
 insight and the experience, the knowledge and the ability, to 
 weigh difficult and responsible engineering problems. I ha.ve 
 heard men who ought to know better define an engineer as a 
 man who can do for one dollar what another man can do for 
 two ; unquestionably, an engineer worthy of his name is capable 
 of doing this, but how foolish to consider the province of the 
 engineer thus limited by this sagaciously silly phrase! Men 
 who spring such catch-phrases upon the public are at fault for 
 the singular lack of esteem in which the engineering profession 
 is still held in many quarters. Speaking for the moment with 
 particular reference to the electrical engineer and his work, I 
 would say that, while he shows his ability in designing a ten 
 thousand kilowatt generator with the amount of material used 
 five years ago for a five thousand kilowatt generator, he simply 
 could not have formerly designed a ten thousand kilowatt gen- 
 erator at all until he had learned how to use the materials at 
 his disposal to better advantage. His object has been to con- 
 dense into smaller space a power unit which was needed for 
 some particular purpose, and not at all to do with one dollar 
 what anyone else could have done with two. Often the saving 
 of material that would appear merely a commercial advantage 
 to the uninitiated, is the only means by which a certain engineer- 
 ing result can be accomplished. The reduction of mass in the 
 reciprocating parts of high-speed steam engines is more essen- 
 tial for engineering reasons than for commercial; the high in- 
 duction in parts of the magnetic circuit of electric generators 
 and motors is one of the most efficient means for obtaining good 
 operation, saving also in the amount of material used. So it 
 may be said, without being paradoxical, that sometimes the en- 
 gineer cannot accomplish for two dollars that which can be ac- 
 complished with the expense of only one dollar. Engineers who 
 
 19 
 
have no creative ability often believe that they have done great 
 work by cutting out a few thousand pounds of cast iron from a 
 fly-wheeLof an engine designed some years ago by some great 
 engineer, and having proved to be somewhat too conservative; 
 or by saving a little cast iron in the yoke of a generator 
 designed by some other man which has since been found to 
 be amply strong in rigidity. What would such men have 
 done if they had had to do the original work? But as there 
 are plenty of quacks in the medical profession, so there are 
 plenty of quacks in the engineering profession. The medical 
 quacks usually make plenty of money and plenty of noise; and 
 so do the engineering quacks. It behooves the engineering so- 
 cieties, the engineering clubs, and the engineering schools to 
 plainly stigmatize the engineering quacks, just as the medical 
 societies in the medical profession have stigmatized the medical 
 quacks. In France there has existed for many years the custom 
 of giving a technical education to lawyers and statesmen. I 
 believe that at the bottom of this lies the realization of the 
 fact that a scientific education enlarged and made real by the 
 application of science to engineering problems, gives men that 
 power of observation which is, in my opinion, the most impor- 
 tant feature of any educational training. We obtain our knowl- 
 edge from nature by observation, and those who cannot observe 
 and draw correct inferences from their observations cannot aid 
 in the progress of science and engineering. 
 
 The matter of greatest importance which I have endeavored 
 to bring out and upon which I wish to dwell particularly, is 
 the necessity of engaging the most eminent engineers as teach- 
 ers. This can readily be done if they are granted enough time 
 to still pursue their professions. It should then be left to these 
 men to train the associate professors and instructors whose en- 
 tire time should be devoted to the supervision of the students. 
 This one step would work a revolution in the methods of teach- 
 
 20 
 
ing. By thus closely bringing together the man who teaches 
 pure mathematics, abstract dynamics, and abstract physics with 
 the practical engineer, both will profit considerably. The ab- 
 stract teacher will obtain examples for his students from the 
 practical man and, conversely, the practical man will remain in 
 touch with pure theory. The practical engineer will insist upon 
 the students learning to sketch, to draw, and to work out prob- 
 lems in a thorough and responsible manner. If there is any one 
 defect more obvious than another in the training of the graduate 
 students, it is the utter failure to appreciate the seriousness of 
 responsibility down to the slightest detail. Their handwriting 
 is illegible ; their figures are confused ; their sevens look like their 
 twos ; they cannot letter ; they cannot sketch ; they cannot draw ; 
 they cannot count the speed of a machine accurately; and all 
 these things do not seem to have even been impressed upon them 
 as being of importance. Their disregard for decimals is appall- 
 ing, and what that means I need not dwell on at length. A stress 
 in a certain part is figured at two thousand pounds per square 
 inch, when it should be twenty thousand pounds ; the resistance 
 of a winding is .02 ohms when it should be .002 ohms, and so on. 
 I could multiply examples without end. Most of the manufactur- 
 ing concerns have been obliged to institute regular training- 
 schools for these young men in which it is the endeavor of the 
 instructing engineer to make the young men unlearn much that 
 they have learned, so as to make them receptive for our methods. 
 When you mention to some college professors the necessity of 
 the students being trained in sketching and drawing, answer is 
 made that the universities do not care to educate draughtsmen. 
 This is a silly reply. The engineer should be a competent 
 draughtsman, though he need not spend his life at the board. 
 He must be capable of representing quickly an idea in the shape 
 of a diagram or a sketch. 
 
 There should be little difference between the education of the 
 
 21 
 
electrical engineer and the mechanical engineer. Electrical en- 
 gineering is but a branch of mechanical engineering. Who would 
 want to. educate ' Hhermo-dynamic " engineers? and yet this 
 would be no more absurd than to educate electrical engineers. 
 The sooner we recognize the fact that successful electrical en- 
 gineering is synonymous with successful mechanical engineering, 
 the better it will be. Thirty years ago the designers of telegraph 
 instruments turned their attention to dynamo design and did not 
 make much headway. It was not until such men as C. E. L. 
 Brown and Gisbert Kapp developed electric apparatus along 
 mechanical lines that the era of heavy electrical engineering be- 
 gan. 
 
 The more theory in college the better ! The students cannot 
 receive good practical instruction at college, hence let them get 
 as much theoretical training as possible. Mechanical labora- 
 tories are very well and better than football, but they do not at 
 all take the place of a year's training in a shop. It is customary 
 in Europe that engineering students work for at least one year 
 in a shop before entering college, and this seems to me prefer- 
 able to^our custom of allowing the students to work in the shop 
 after graduation. The explanation of the European system is 
 found in the fact that the engineering teachers, themselves prac- 
 tical men, have found it difficult to teach young men who have 
 had no shop training. The more shop training the better. It is 
 foolish to have young men design apparatus which nobody can 
 build rationally with the tools and the machinery at the disposal 
 of a large manufacturing plant. Let the high school graduate 
 work in a machine shop, according to his ability and inclination, 
 for one or two years and let him be thrown into contact with 
 working men, their methods, and their lives. It will do him 
 good in his future work and it will show him how easy it is to 
 make a drawing, and how difficult it is to build the apparatus 
 according to such drawing. He will become thoroughly awake 
 
 22 
 
to the problems which the practical men have to solve and he will 
 be a much better and brighter student in college, keenly appre- 
 ciating the tremendous assistance rendered him by sound theory. 
 
 American universities are very rich in comparison with Eu- 
 ropean schools, but the disbursement of their funds should be 
 with a view to obtaining good teachers rather than obtaining 
 magnificent buildings and equipment. As soon as brilliant and 
 competent teachers, who have shown their mettle in life, obtain 
 a foothold in these institutions of scientific engineering, they will 
 work out their own salvation. 
 
 I have alluded in passing in this paper to the necessity of a 
 sound moral training in the young engineer. Having entered 
 life, he will be confronted with temptation at every step. To 
 cheapen his designs, he will be tempted to use poor materials 
 leading to disastrous results ; he will be tempted to make better 
 guarantees than he can obtain, owing to the pressure from com- 
 petition ; and, most abject of all, his influence will be coveted for 
 the obtaining of large contracts in the letting of which he has a 
 voice. Such crimes will be more flagrant in him than in the or- 
 dinary business man. The latter cannot plead the inspiration 
 and the example of the men of science, to which we owe the 
 sources of our knowledge. There can be no better foundation 
 laid in the minds of these young engineers than is given them by 
 the example of the long line of brilliant scientific men who, like 
 noble ancestors, should inspire them with the dignity and grand- 
 eur of their profession. Let them read the lives of great scien- 
 tific men ; let them admire the keen intellect and the devotion to 
 scientific work of Leonardo da Vinci, of Galileo, of Newton, of 
 Faraday, of Helmholtz, of Kelvin, and of Huxley. Let them 
 emulate the example of great engineers like Siemens, Rankine, 
 Hopkinson, Reynolds, and other men whose lives are an in- 
 spiration, and they will be steeled against the perverting tempta- 
 tions of their profession. 
 
 23 
 
Mr. Andrew D. White, co-founder and first president of Cor- 
 nell University, that great American institution of learning 
 which stands out as the first university in this country, in which 
 the teachers were chosen without regard to sectarian leanings, 
 said once that ''our great disease is indifference — indifference 
 to truth as truth, and the little army of scientific men furnishes 
 a precious germ from which better ideas may spring. And," 
 the great educator proceeds, ''we should strengthen them. We 
 have already multitudes of foundations and appliances for the 
 dilution of truth — for the stunting of truth — for the promotion 
 of half-truths — for the development of this or that side of truth. 
 We have no end of intellectual hot-house arrangements for the 
 cultivation of the plausible rather than the true; and therefore 
 it is that we ought to attach vast value to the men who, with 
 calmness and determination seek THE TRUTH, in its whole- 
 ness, on whatever line of investigation, not diluting it or masking 
 it. Their zeal, their devotion, their faith, furnish one of those 
 very protests which are most needed against that low tone of 
 political ideas which, in its lower strata, is political corruption. 
 Their life gives that very example of a high spirit, aim, and 
 work, which the time so greatly needs ! " 
 
 24- 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 The editorial comments on this paper, published in the Electrical 
 World, January 5, 1907, and which are here printed, tlioroughly 
 bring ont a point npon which I failed to enlarge as it should have been 
 done. I therefore commend this editorial to the reader, as it dwells npon 
 the necessity of didactic f acnlty in engineering teachers : 
 
 Editorial from Electrical World, January 5, 1907. 
 
 ENGINEERING EDUCATION. 
 
 We commend to onr readers the remarkable article printed else- 
 where on "Engineering Education." The w^riter, Mr. B. A. Behrend, 
 is not only exceptionally qnalified by education, by knowledge of both 
 European and American instructional methods, and by engineering ex- 
 perience, to discuss the subject authoritatively, but moreover possesses 
 in a high degree the gift of literary expression. While agreeing in the 
 main with the views of Mr. Behrend, we feel that one very important 
 aspect of the subject has not received consideration, and that is the art 
 of the teacher — the art of exposition on which the writer himself has 
 such a strong grasp. Assuming that an engineer is a great leader in 
 his profession and that his achievements should be a source of inspiration 
 to students, he may nevertheless be lacking in all of the qualities of a 
 teacher. As we review the line of great teachers from Socrates to 
 Huxley, from Alcuin to Kelvin, we must perforce acknowledge that the 
 art of training the immature mind is one requiring for its highest per- 
 formance specific qualities no less rare and no less important than those 
 widely different ones which lead to eminence in the practice of engineer- 
 ing. Merely to impart bare information is but one of the functions of 
 the teacher; he should also, consciously or unconsciously, be a psychol- 
 ogist adept in the processes of the mind, and possessed of a sympa- 
 thetic knowledge of adolescent human nature. His function is that 
 of developing the mind, of training its powders no less than storing it 
 
 25 
 
with formulas and facts. Moreover, the school period of the engineer 
 should be one pre-eminently for the acquisition of fundamental prin- 
 ciples, for the laying of the foundation upon which the after engineering 
 career shall be erected. An engineer has been defined as a man ^Vith 
 some technical knowledge and trained judgment." As between a good 
 teacher and a good engineer, the former is more competent to impart 
 the fundamental technical knowledge, and judgment can only be trained 
 in actual hourly contact with practical work involving the commercial 
 factor, where a failure of judgment may mean the temporary loss of 
 a livelihood. There are some instances where the engineer embodies 
 also the teacher — we need only mention Thurston and Burr, Behrend 
 and Steinmetz — but it is a rare combination. In so far as the engineer 
 supplements the work of the trained and professional teacher, we agree 
 with Mr. Behrend as to his educational value. 
 
 26 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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