Excerpt from Papers and Transactions for 1923 and Proceedings of the Thirty-Ninth Annual Meeting at Hartford, February 20 and 21, 1923 The cause is largely due to the fact that the accomplishments of engineers are apt to be taken for granted and are so necessarily a part of our every day life that little thought attaches to them For example, people will gaze at a building which touches the Clouds and be impressed that it is some high but will hardly give a thought to the achievement from an engineering standpoint which it exemplifies. In this same towering structure, passengers will step into an elevator to be transported twenty, thirty, or more stories with no apprehension as to their safety, and will enjoy the same comforts as to health and convenience on every floor from the bottom to the top. The traveling public will enter a subway and be transported for miles beneath the surface, passing under built up sections of cities and extensive bodies of water with more confidence than they would have on the surface of a congested thoroughfare. Mighty bridges are built to cross our largest streams with spans of almost unbelievable length and millions of people use them daily with the utmost safety and as a matter of course. Bountiful supplies of pure wholesome water are brought to our Cities from sources in the hills miles away, and the wastes of our centers of population are removed with every safeguard to the health and comfort of our people. The better modern pavements are the work of engineers and are designed and built to last until the date of their installation is but a recollection. The tremendous energy of falling waters is harnessed and transported great distances to centers where it can be put to work for the benefit of mankind. And the engineer has been the man behind the gun in all of these accomplishments. I could continue indefinitely to emphasize the importance which attaches to engineers, whether they be Civil, mechanical, electrical, Chemical or engineers of allied branches, and even then the story would be but half told. It would be difficult to say which branch of engineering is making the most rapid advancement, but certain it is that all are making strides such that it is hard to keep up with them. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.