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In this comprehensive social history of Columbia University's School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS), Robert McCaughey combines archival research with oral testimony and contemporary interviews to build both a critical and celebratory portrait of one of the oldest engineering schools in the United States. McCaughey follows the evolving, occasionally rocky, and now integrated relationship between SEAS's engineers and the rest of the Columbia University student body, faculty, and administration. He also revisits the interaction between the SEAS staff and the inhabitants and institutions of the City of New York, where the school has resided since its founding in 1864. He compares the historical struggles and achievements of the school's engineers with their present-day battles and accomplishments, and he contrasts their teaching and research approaches to those of their peers at other free-standing and Ivy league engineering schools.
What begins as a localized history of a school striving to define itself within a university known for its strengths in the humanities and the social sciences becomes a wider story of the transformation of the applied sciences into a critical component of American technology and education.
List of contents
IllustrationsForewordPrefaceAcknowledgments1. Engineering in America -- Before Engineers2. Fast Start 1864--18893. A Corner in the University 1889--19294. The Great Depression and the Good War 1930--19455. Missing the Boat 1945--19646. Bottoming Out 1965--19757. Catching a Lift 1976--19808. Uneven Ascent 1980--19949. A School in Full 1995--200710. A Lever Long Enough: SEAS at One Hundred FiftyNotesA Bibliographic NoteIndex
About the author
Robert McCaughey is professor of history and Janet H. Robb Chair in the Social Sciences at Barnard College, where he has also served as dean of the faculty. Has written extensively on the history of American cultural institutions and the American professoriate, including the books Stand, Columbia: A History of Columbia University in the City of New York, 1754-2004 and The American Nation: A History of the United States, seventh edition (with J. A. Garraty).
