{"product_id":"from-insight-to-innovation-engineering-ideas-that-transformed-america-in-the-twentieth-century","title":"From Insight to Innovation: Engineering Ideas That Transformed America in the Twentieth Century","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe engineering ideas behind key twentieth-century technical innovations, from great dams and highways to the jet engine, the transistor, the microchip, and the computer.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 700;\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cp\u003eTechnology is essential to modern life, yet few of us are technology-literate enough to know much about the engineering that underpins it. In this book, David P. Billington, Jr., offers accessible accounts of the key twentieth-century engineering innovations that brought us into the twenty-first century. Billington examines a series of engineering advances—from Hoover Dam and jet engines to the transistor, the microchip, the computer, and the internet—and explains how they came about and how they work.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEach of these innovations tells a unique story. The great dams of the New Deal brought huge rivers under control, and a national highway system interconnected the nation, as did jet air travel. The transistor and the microchip originated in the private sector and found a mass market after early government support. The computer and the internet began as government projects and found a mass market later in the private sector. Billington finds that engineers with unconventional insights could succeed in a bureaucratic age; what mattered were independent vision and a society that welcomed innovation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis book completes the story of American engineering begun with the earlier volumes \u003ci\u003eThe Innovators\u003c\/i\u003e (by the author's father) and \u003ci\u003ePower, Speed, and Form\u003c\/i\u003e (by the author and his father).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"MIT Press","offers":[{"title":"Bargain","offer_id":42987337810000,"sku":"9780262044301B","price":20.49,"currency_code":"CAD","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/bookoutlet.com\/en-ca\/products\/from-insight-to-innovation-engineering-ideas-that-transformed-america-in-the-twentieth-century","provider":"Book Outlet","version":"1.0","type":"link"}