“THE DECORATED MACHINE” AT THE CHICAGO MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY BAYLA SINGER “The Decorated Machine,” a temporary exhibit at Chicago’s Mu seum of Science and Industry, explored the aesthetic standards ap plied to American-made machines in the 19th century. Two schools of thought emerged: one favored strict functionalism, and another preferred additional design elements consistent with popular taste in other areas. Most of the artifacts displayed were examples of the latter, while a careful balance of viewpoints was presented by the text on freestanding wall panels. The exhibit was tightly focused, and its theme is not trivial. At a time when the direction of the interaction between technology and culture is under vigorous discussion,1 this exhibit reminded us that identical standards were applied to objects in both the manufacturing and consuming sectors and that the transition in taste from “Victorian” embellishment to “modern” streamlined functionalism (sometimes re ferred to as “machine style”) was approximately simultaneous across sectors. The debate over aesthetic criteria continued throughout the 19th century and involved factory machinery as well as consumer items.2 Dr. Singer, an independent scholar in the Chicago area, was formerly an exhibit associate at the Franklin Institute Science Museum in Philadelphia. }Among recent works discussing this issue in several disciplines are John Law, “On the Social Explanation of Technical Change: The Case of the Portuguese Maritime Expansion,” Technology and Culture 28 (1987): 227—52; Gwendolyn Wright, Moralism and the Model Home: Domestic Architecture and Cultural Conflict in Chicago, 1873—1913 (Chicago, 1980); Joseph J. Corn, ed., Imagining Tomorrow: History, Technology, and the American Future (Cambridge, Mass., 1986); Howard P. Segal, Technological Utopianism in American Culture (Chicago, 1985); Cecelia Tichi, Shifting Gears: Technology, Literature, Culture in Modernist America (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1987). 2Herwin Schaefer, Nineteenth-Century Modem: The Functional Tradition in Victorian De sign (New York, 1970), profusely illustrated; Horatio Greenough, Form and Function: Remarks on Art, Design, and Architecture (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1940), which reprints a lively group of essays written in mid-19th century. Both books present examples of the “functional” argument, from the early 19th century onward. I am indebted to Dr. Kevin Harrington of the Illinois Institute of Technology Department of Humanities for these references.© 1988 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/88/2903-0004$01.00 619 620 Bayla Singer The representative selection displayed in the exhibit ranged from small steam engines and a printing press to typewriters, sewing ma chines, and a cherry pitter. The visitor could compare them to other examples of contemporary taste: an elegant chair, a photograph al bum, and a cast-iron architectural ornament were among the non machine artifacts present. Labels called attention to specific design elements, and cross-referred to other exhibit items, in addition to identifying the artifact and its venue. Unfortunately, there was no discussion of mechanical considerations underlying some of the de sign elements. For example, “graceful” splayed legs provide a more stable base than would simple vertical members, and curves often distribute or accommodate stresses more appropriately than do straight lines. Text in “The Decorated Machine” was used sparingly and to ex cellent effect. A typical wall panel carried a section heading (identi fying a type of decoration) in large font, a 19th-century engraving showing factory, commercial, or household items in use, and a richly concise comment or contemporary quotation in somewhat smaller type setting forth a point of view pertinent to the aesthetic debate. For example, these excerpts from Scientific American were on separate panels: “The most important advantage to be found in the union of beauty with utility is the increased dignity it confers upon labor . . . [The] attempt dignifies and sweetens his toil” (1868); and “A cluster of roses looks very pretty in the center of a panel of an enameled bedstead. On the blade of a barn shovel such an ornament would be simply ridiculous” (1870). Panel text citing 19th-century advocates of ornamentation offered practical considerations: labor relations, as in the example above, or competition with elegant foreign-made items. Decoration was cost effective because customers expected and demanded it on items con sidered “fine”; decoration contributed to pride...