* Henry Petroski - Adventures in Engineering and Design (20 books, 170 papers)
HENRY PETROSKI (1942 – 2023) was an American engineer specializing in failure analysis. A professor both of civil engineering and history at Duke University, he was also a prolific author who demystified engineering with literary examinations of the designs and failures of large structures like buildings and bridges, as well as common, everyday objects, such as pencils, paper clips, toothpicks, and silverware. His readership included a wide range of engineers who enjoyed his books because they presented the bigger picture of the profession, as well as non-engineers and armchair inventors.
Petroski adapted the architectural axiom "form follows function" into one of his own — "form follows failure" — and addressed the subject extensively in books, lectures, scholarly journals, newspapers and magazines. "Failure is central to engineering," he said in a 2006 interview with The New York Times. "Every single calculation that an engineer makes is a failure calculation. Successful engineering is all about understanding how things break or fail."
The sinking of a North Sea oil rig in 1980, followed the next year by the ruinous collapse of elevated walkways inside the Kansas City Hyatt Regency Hotel, spurred Petroski to investigate some of the more notable failures of engineering. His first book, TO ENGINEER IS HUMAN: THE ROLE OF FAILURE IN SUCCESSFUL DESIGN (1985), explained relevant engineering principles and how engineers deal with such risks in a way that non-professionals could understand. More than a series of fascinating case studies, the book examines our deepest notions of progress and perfection, tracing the fine connection between the quantifiable realm of science and the chaotic realities of everyday life.
Petroski earned a great deal of critical attention for THE PENCIL: A HISTORY OF DESIGN AND CIRCUMSTANCE (1990). More than just the chronological story of a humble object, Petroski argued the pencil and its development is symbolic for all technological advance. Though its creation was born of the accidental discovery of graphite, the perfection of the pencil as an artifact evolved by deliberate inventiveness, and what resulted was an object that nearly every literate person on the planet has used. "The very commonness of the pencil, the characteristic of it that renders it all but invisible and seemingly valueless, is really the first feature of successful engineering," Petroski wrote. "Good engineering blends into the environment, becomes a part of society and culture so naturally that a special effort is required to notice it."
THE EVOLUTION OF USEFUL THINGS (1992) contains essays on the evolution of the paper clip, the Post-it Note, the zipper, fast-food packaging, masking tape, and even the safety pin. Another collection of essays, REMAKING THE WORLD: ADVENTURES IN ENGINEERING (1997), explores the ways in which engineers sometimes inadvertently alter the course of history. "The book's real charm," one reviewer wrote, "lies in the countless anecdotes and bits of historic and engineering trivia that pepper each essay, rich details guaranteed to stay with you."
His other books include THE TOOTHPICK: TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE (2007), which examines its evolution from a form used by early hominids to the creation of the modern toothpick industry in the 19th century; SMALL THINGS CONSIDERED: WHY THERE IS NO PERFECT DESIGN (2003); and TO FORGIVE DESIGN: UNDERSTANDING FAILURE (2012), which continues where "To Engineer Is Human" ended, with analyses of the loss of NASA's two space shuttles, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and other epic engineering fails.
Henry Petroski died on June 14, 2023, in Durham, North Carolina.
In addition to 170 papers (unlisted), the following books are in ePub and/or PDF format as indicated:
* An Engineer's Alphabet (Cambridge, 2011) – PDF * The Book on the Bookshelf (Knopf, 1999) – ePub * Design Paradigms (Cambridge, 1994) – ePub * Engineers of Dreams (Vintage, 1996) – ePub * The Essential Engineer (Knopf, 2010) – ePub * The Evolution of Useful Things (Vintage, 1994) – ePub * Force (Yale, 2022) – ePub + PDF * The House with Sixteen Handmade Doors (Norton, 2014) – ePub * Invention by Design (Harvard, 1996) – PDF * Paperboy: Confessions of a Future Engineer (Vintage, 2003) – PDF * The Pencil: A History of Design & Circumstance (Knopf, 2010) – ePub * Pushing the Limits: New Adventures in Engineering (Vintage, 2005) – ePub * Remaking the World: Adventures in Engineering (Vintage, 1999) – ePub * The Road Taken (Bloomsbury, 2016) – ePub * Small Things Considered (Vintage, 2004) – ePub * Success Through Failure (Princeton, 2006) – ePub * Success Through Failure [with new Preface] (Princeton, 2018) – PDF * To Engineer is Human (St. Martin's, 2018) – ePub * To Forgive Design: Understanding Failure (Harvard, 2012) – PDF * The Toothpick: Technology and Culture (Knopf, 2007) – ePub
