Elmer Sperry: Inventor and Engineer (Johns Hopkins Studies in the History of Technology)

Book info: Elmer Sperry: Inventor and Engineer (Johns Hopkins Studies in the History of Technology) (Paperback, 368 pages) – Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993. Language: English.

A major American inventor who obtained more than 350 patents during his lifetime, Elmer Sperry contributed greatly to the momentous technological changes that occurred between 1880 and 1930. Best known for the Sperry gyrocompass and automatic pilot, his inventions included arc-light systems, mining machinery, electric automobiles and streetcars, and electrochemical processes. A characteristic of his various inventions was feedback control, which has made automation a fact of life. Richly illustrated with 149 photographs and line drawings, the first full-length biography now returns to print in a paperback edition. Editorial Reviews Review Superb . . . In this careful study of a single inventor, Hughes has done more to demonstrate the 'questionable' nature of traditional accounts of invention than all of the theoretical arguments of the past few years combined.
―Technology and Culture About the Author Thomas P. Hughes is professor of the history of modern science and technology at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His books include Changing Attitudes toward American Technology and Elmer Sperry, Inventor and Engineer.