2008 Morison Lecture and Prize in Science, Technology and Society
The New Epoch and the 21st Century Imperative for Engineering History"
David P. Billington
Gordon Y.S. Wu Professor of Engineering,
Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
and Director, Program of Architecture and Engineering, Princeton University
May 2, 2008
2:00 pm, MIT, Bartos Theater (Building E15, lower level)
The Morison Lecture and Prize, was established by
the Morison family and the Hitchiner
Manufacturing Co., Inc., to recognize the
technical and societal accomplishments of several
generations of Morison family members, and of the
engineers of the Hitchiner Co. as well as the
contributions of Massachusetts Institute of
Technology faculty members and graduates to the
growth and success of that company.
The Morison Lecture and Prize in Science,
Technology and Society is intended to honor
individuals, selected internationally, who have
demonstrated commitment to, and effectiveness in,
carrying out the ideals of the Morison
family. The Morison Prize recognizes the
accomplishments of an individual who has made
major contributions at the interface between
science and technology on the one hand and
matters of societal concern on the other.
David P. Billington has been selected as the
recipient of the 2008 Morison Lecture and Prize
in Science, Technology, and Society. Billington
is the Gordon Y.S. Wu Professor of Engineering,
Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
and Director, Program of Architecture and
Engineering, at Princeton University.
Professor Billington is well known at Princeton
for connecting engineering to other disciplines
within the University to the humanities, art,
science and politics. His courses in Structures
and the Urban Environment and Engineering in
the Modern World combine the study of
engineering with an exploration of the aesthetic
and social values intrinsic to it, an association
of ideas that have made them some of the most
popular courses among engineering and
non-engineering students for decades. Billington
has taught perhaps 5,000 Princeton undergraduates
since joining the faculty in 1960. He specializes
in structural analysis and design with an
emphasis on concrete structures, bridge design,
thin shell concrete structures, and the history
and aesthetics of structures as an art form.
Billingtons recent publications include Power,
Speed and Form Engineers and the Making of the
Twentieth Century (with David P. Billington, Jr.)
(Princeton University Press, 2006); The Art of
Structural Design: A Swiss Legacy (Yale
University Press, 2003); Robert Maillart:
Builder, Designer and Architect (Cambridge
University Press, 1997); The Innovators: The
Engineering Pioneers Who Made America Modern
(John Wiley & Sons, 1996); and Robert Maillart
and the Art of Reinforced Concrete (The MIT
Press, 1990). In 1996, Princeton honored
Billington with the President's Distinguished
Teaching Award in recognition of his sustained
record of excellence as a teacher at the graduate
and undergraduate levels. He is a member of the
National Academy of Engineering and a Fellow of
the American Academy of the Arts and
Sciences. In 1999 the Engineering News Record
named Billington one of the five top educators in
the construction industry over the past 125
years. In 2003, he received the Director's
Distinguished Teaching Scholar Award from the
National Science Foundation. Recently, the
National Academy of Engineering selected
Billington as its Walter Robb Engineering
Education Senior Fellow for 20052006. In 2006 he
served as a Robert Noyce Visiting Professor at Grinnell College.
MITs Program in Science, Technology, and Society
and the School of Engineering invite MIT and the
community to attend the 2008 Morison Prize
Lecture in Science, Technology and Society on May
2. A reception will immediately follow Professor Billington's lecture.
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