Assembling a New Hall of Civil Engineering

Abstract

of the processes by which it was conceived, designed, and given physical form is of interest not only by virtue of its unique position among American museums but because certain aspects of its realization are common to the preparation of museum exhibit halls in other fields of science and technology. Despite its importance in man's adaptation to his surroundings, the field of civil engineering has, until the recent past, received hardly more than token treatment in technical museums anywhere. This deficiency is plainly a result of the size of the objects created by civil engineering. A bridge or dam does not respond to the format of conventional museum exhibit with the same facility as a collection of rare coins, or an early surveying instrument, or even, for that matter, a locomotive. Nor do the works of the civil engineer, taken at their face value, generate the same degree of interest in the average person. The problem, therefore, was how to produce a civil engineering exhibit which would both kindle the interest of the museum visitor and provide him with some knowledge and understanding of this major area of human endeavor.