Robert William Chapman

“ Even more important than any direct knowledge that a young man gets from University studies is the viewpoint that he gains. The outlook of a man with a scientific training is entirely different from that of the man with practical experience as his only guide. He is best equipped to take the broad view and subjugate petty personal feelings in a search for the knowledge necessary to the solution of a practical problem. ”

“ It is that the University School should itself be a centre of inspiration for the engineering profession; that it should be a place where original experimental work is always being carried on, where inventions are tried out, and where engineering firms may come for help in carrying out tests and experiments to advance technical knowledge, and particularly to assist in the solution of engineering problems of special importance to the State.
All the large modern engineering and manufacturing corporations have realized the value of scientific research. ”

“ At the University of Paris the four faculties were Theology, Law, Medicine, and Philosophy, which were represented as the four streams of learning that were like unto the rivers of Paradise. But in this Paradise science had no part, and of practical applications of science there could be none. A well-known definition of civil engineering states that it is "the art of directing the great sources of power in nature for the use arid convenience of man." ”

“ But that is no reason why we should do nothing. No one in touch with engineering practice will deny that there are plenty of problems that S.A. engineers would like to have solved, many of them, like that of our brown coals, being local problems that we can scarcely expect outsiders to solve for us.
Let me illustrate the value to the nation of scientific research, combined with engineering invention, by a story from our own recent history. ”

“ It became a tradition in Engineering that the only school worth anything was the school of practical experience. Even long after the sciences of Mechanics and Hydraulics had become well established courses at Universities, such studies were neglected by engineers whose hard practical training tended to give them little sympathy with the abstruse and often impractical and unreal problems commonly discussed by the mathematicians. ”

“ For the finger of God is surely the compelling power of the laws of Nature, and the erection of such a structure is made possible only by the accurate calculation of theforces acting upon each member of the bridge in accordance with those laws; a computation that no man could make from the knowledge won by his own experience alone. ”

“ Every branch of Engineering has the same story to tell. You all know what a vital force was scientific engineering in the great war. The Germans had the first advantage, largely because for a generation they had devoted the energies of a large proportion of their scientific men to the devices of military engineering. ”

“ ENGINEERING AND THE UNIVERSITY
Engineering is the Cinderella among the professions. You will remember that Cinderella was not only the youngest among the sisters, but she it was who was the maid-of-all-work while they got all the education and all the fine clothes and went out to balls and parties, until that happy time arrived when she married the Prince. And so from the very beginnings of Universities it was thought right and proper that they should undertake the training of lawyers, physicians and surgeons, clergymen, teachers and philosophers. ”

“ It is not enough that he should be able to compute the stresses on the various members of a bridge y and even to produce a creditable design; he must know how to erect it without killing his men and without ruining the contractor. If he is a mechanical engineer, he must have that practical knowledge of workshop methods that will enable him to design an engine or machine that will not only work when made, but which can be constructed at a reasonable cost. ”

“ We have taken pride in the remarkable powers of self-reliance and initiative that were shown by our Australian soldiers in the great war. We perhaps flatter ourselves that these are qualities that are bred- in the clear skies and broad expanses of our Australian continent. ”

“ It is the law of Nature, and if we would survive we must prove ourselves to be fit. We cannot do that if we neglect the development of the highest qualities of the human mind, the qualities upon which human progress has chiefly depended. ”

“ In all of these instances the cost of the operation is a first consideration,, and it is obvious that it is only by actual experience in the handling of large numbers of men and big quantities of materials that any man can become competent. Clearly this kind of experience is not to be got at a University. University lectures may -assist by setting out certain general guiding principles, but proficiency in such work is only to be obtained by actually doing it. If this were all that a University could do it would not be worth while to have an Engineering School at all. ”

“ We may state at the outset that no University or Technical School in the world can furnish the complete training for an engineer. The scientific laboratories of a University cannot possibly give the same kind of experience as that obtained in practical workshops or on the construction of large works. It is not sufficient for a man to know how to test cement and gravel in order that he may determine in what proportions to mix them so as to obtain thedensest possible concrete ”

“ Being self-taught, but with some little ambition, and a determination to improve himself, he was now enabled to stand before them with some pretensions to mechanical knowledge, and the persuasion that he had been a useful contributor to practical science and objects connected with mechanical engineering. ”

“ The new regulations about to be introduced into the South Australian service by the present Government will improve the present conditions in this State considerably, but a still closer co-operation between the University and the Government engineering departments is desirable. Other things being equal, experience in all countries has amply proved that the trained man is bound to make the best engineer in the long run, and there is every reason why the Government service should have recruits of the highest efficiency. ”

“ It is everywhere the active agent that stimulates progress. Even in branches of Engineering commonly regarded as purely practical arts, such as road engineering, experience, has shown that the most successful engineers are those who apply to the practical problems minds having knowledge of related sciences and trained in scientific method, and in several American Universities special Degree courses are now given for Road Engineers. ”

“ But besides the training of the young engineer in the foundation principles of his profession, there is another object of a University engineering school that is of even equal importance. Indeed, some of our big University brothers have been telling us that unless we keep this object well to the fore we cannot be regarded as a real University at all. ”

“ The Eastman Kodak, General Electric, American Rolling Mill Co., Detroit Edison Co., and others spend as much as 20,000 to 60,000 a year on research work. In this State, our engineering and manufacturing enterprises are, as a rule, too small to be able to provide research departments of their own, and for that very reason,a well-equipped University laboratory is of the more importance, for it could give assistance in many difficulties. ”

“ But it is an anomaly in several of the States that whilst Parliaments have for many years given considerable grants in aid of various forms of technical education, and by speech and deed such training is recognized by all political parties as of the greatest value to the State, vet little practical encouragement is given, either to the young men already in or to those about to enter Government engineering departments, to make the effort necessary to benefit from the instruction supplied. ”

“ The Queensland University began with Schools in Arts, Science, and Engineering, and none in Medicine nor Law. So did the University of Western Australia. Even the Institution of Civil Engineers, a body of practical professional men, for long holding very conservative views with regard to methods of training of Engineers, has for some years recommended a minimum course of three years at the Engineering School of a University, the recommendation being unanimously adopted by the committee appointed to report upon the subject. ”

“ But if he takes the trouble, first of all, before he builds it, to climb to the top of the great hill that has been raised in the course of generations by the great men of the past, the army of scientific workers of all. nations, then, building his own edifice on top of that, a man may raise himself to an elevation that shall command the broadest possible outlook. If, however, he build upon the plain below, his view will .always be narrow and limited.
Take as an illustration the case of an engineer working with that great building material of recent times, reinforced concrete. ”

“ We have our own problems that require their own solutions, and it should be our ambition to lead the way and not follow in the wake. The war is over, but the competition between nations continues. It cannot be diminished by Peace Conferences nor evaded by philanthropic projects. ”

“ There are some branches of Engineering, such as Electrical Engineering, that have obviously been almost entirely dependent for their advancement upon scientific investigation, but there are no branches that can progress without it. James Watt, who was trained as a maker of scientific instruments, showed keen appreciation of this fact when he completed his inventions relating' to the steam engine by the invention of the indicator. ”

“ It is no exaggeration to say that the invention has not only enabled us to do something that we could not do before, but to the British nation it k has resulted in the saving altogether of millions of pounds worth of coal and oil. The direct monetary gain to the nation from this one invention has certainly been a great deal more than the whole of the money spent upon Melbourne University from its inception. ”

“ If he is a civil engineer, he may be required to determine the appliances to be used, and to order the work of large gangs of men in the shifting of thousands of cubic yards of earth or rock in cutting, dam, or embankment, and it has to be done to leave a margin of profit. ”

“ As a broad definition this would be difficult to improve upon, and it is obvious that until science had developed far enough to be able to enunciate the laws governing the forces of nature it was impossible to have anything but empirical rules to govern engineering design and construction. ”

“ So much of the civil engineering work of the State is under the control of the Government that this can only be secured by their help and co-operation, but surely no better recruits could be got for the service. ”

“ Since then Engineering Schools have been established at one University after another, until to-day even Cambridge has its Engineering laboratories and a Mechanical Science Tripos, and Oxford its Department of Engineering Science. ”

“ It certainly is much to be regretted that we do not induce a greater proportion of the Angas scholars, who represent the pick of our engineering graduates, to come back to South Australia, and so carry out the intentions of the founder of the scholarship. ”

“ We cannot expect the State of South Australia, with a population of less than half a million of people, and with the demands upon its revenue due to the vast area that it covers, can afford to provide the same facilities for research work that are given at Manchester or Columbia. ”

“ All of these belonged to professions which were recognized as deserving of that training in knowledge and culture that only the Universities could give, but for the men who were to be engaged in the practical work of building roads and bridges, reservoirs and canals, and otherwise administering to the physical wants of the people, the Universities for a long while had no place. ”

“ Concrete alone is a material strong to resist compression, but weak in tension. It is a simple idea to reinforce it by embedding steel rods in it so as to compensate for this defect and enable the combined material to resist stresses of both kinds. ”

“ Perhaps it is only a consciousness of the large 'factor of safety' used which makes a railway journey endurable for a scientist after a perusal of some of the technical papers published in this decade. ”

“ The community depended upon them for the weapons of the chase and for the weapons of war. They made the bills and battle-axes, the tips for the bowmen's arrows, and the swords and spear-heads for the men-at-arms. ”

“ It could be successfully learned and practised by men who could neither read nor write. It had no basis of scientific knowledge. With the growth of requirements due to the development of large towns, some members of the great Smith family became manufacturers, as at Sheffield and Birmingham; others enlarged the. scope of their activities to include more of what we now understand by engineering work. Masons became bridge builders. ”

“ It seems rather strange that this should have been so, because if we go back far enough we find that the smiths, the workers in iron, who were the forerunners of of the modern engineers, occupied a place of great importance in all primitive communities. ”

“ The fact remains that they did build bridges that have carried heavy traffic safely for a century, that they did build railroads and locomotives which served their purpose well, that they did construct effective roads and harbours, and if in many cases the design was neither the best possible nor the most economical, the engineers at least generally erred on the safe side. ”