- Carl Culmann
Carl Culmann (
July 10 ,1821 -December 9 ,1881 ) was a Germanstructural engineer .Born in
Bad Bergzabern ,Rhenish Palatinate , in modern-dayGermany , Culmann's father, a pastor, tutored him at home before enrolling him at the military engineering school atMetz to prepare for entry to theÉcole Polytechnique . Culmann's ambitions were frustrated by an attack oftyphoid and, after a long convalescence, he attended the Karlsruhe Polytechnic School. He joined theBavaria ncivil service in 1841 as anapprentice engineer in the design ofrailroad bridge s.Hartenberg (1981)]Continuing his mathematical studies, in particular under
L. C. Schnürlein , in 1847 Culmann transferred toMunich so that he could improve his English in anticipation of a study tour to theUnited Kingdom and theUnited States . His tour lasted from 1849 to 1851, studying the comparative designs oftruss bridge s and developing new analytical techniques to facilitate his investigations.In 1855, he took up the chair of engineering sciences at the
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ,Zürich , holding the post until his death.Inspired by the work of
Jean-Victor Poncelet , Culmann was a pioneer of graphical methods in engineering, publishing his seminal book on the topic, "Die graphische Statik" ("Graphic Statics") in 1865. He had a profound influence on a generation ofengineer s includingMaurice Koechlin andOtto Mohr Fact|date=August 2007. He died inZürich ,Switzerland . [Anon.] (2001)]References
Bibliography
* [Anon.] "Culmann, Carl", "
Encyclopaedia Britannica ", Deluxe CDROM edition
*Crystal, David (ed.) (1998) "Culmann, Karl (1821-1881)" "The Cambridge Biographical Encyclopedia" (2nd ed.) Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England, ISBN 0-521-63099-1
*Hartenberg, R. S. (1981) "Cullman, Karl" in cite book | author=Gillespie, C.C. (ed.) | year=1981 | location=New York | title=Dictionary of Scientific Biography | publisher=Charles Screibner's Sons | id=ISBN 0-684-16970-3 | pages=495-496
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