III ‑Records of a family of engineers

In this chap­ter, we delve into the pro­fes­sion­al life and under­ly­ing phi­los­o­phy of Robert Steven­son, an esteemed engi­neer known for his prac­ti­cal approach towards engi­neer­ing chal­lenges. Steven­son is renowned not mere­ly for his mechan­i­cal inven­tions, such as the Jib or Bal­ance Crane at the Bell Rock, but more so for his abil­i­ty to project works against nature and mod­u­late the nat­ur­al envi­ron­ment to meet human needs. Whether it involved con­struct­ing roads, build­ings, har­bors, or man­ag­ing riv­er chan­nels, Steven­son exer­cised a pro­found con­nec­tion with the nat­ur­al ele­ments, demon­strat­ing an unpar­al­leled com­mit­ment to under­stand­ing nature’s intri­ca­cies for over half a cen­tu­ry.

A sig­nif­i­cant part of Steven­son’s excel­lence lay in his metic­u­lous obser­va­tion and mea­sure­ment of nat­ur­al phe­nom­e­na, a tes­ta­ment to his belief in the pow­er of men­su­ra­tion. He held a con­vic­tion that engi­neer­ing essen­tial­ly deals with what can be quan­ti­fied and mea­sured, empha­siz­ing the impor­tance of expe­ri­ence, intu­ition, and an ‘exquis­ite sym­pa­thy’ for nature in the field of civ­il engi­neer­ing. Steven­son’s approach to engi­neer­ing was high­ly prac­ti­cal, always con­sid­er­ing the unpre­dictable forces of nature and incor­po­rat­ing a cer­tain ‘tran­scen­den­tal sense’ into his cal­cu­la­tions and pre­dic­tions.

The nar­ra­tive also reveals Steven­son’s pas­sion for chron­i­cling his expe­ri­ences and obser­va­tions, albeit acknowl­edg­ing the lim­i­ta­tions of con­vey­ing such a tac­it knowl­edge through lit­er­a­ture. His exten­sive records, described as a “volu­mi­nous handy-book of nature,” reflect not only a dili­gent pur­suit of pro­fes­sion­al exper­tise but also an ambi­tious, albeit imprac­ti­cal, attempt to doc­u­ment all con­ceiv­able knowl­edge rel­e­vant to engi­neer­ing. Stevenson’s life­long endeav­or to cap­ture the essence of his work and the broad­er scope of engi­neer­ing in his writ­ings under­scores a pio­neer­ing spir­it amidst the evolv­ing land­scape of engi­neer­ing in his time.

Through Steven­son’s sto­ry, we come to appre­ci­ate the bal­ance between empir­i­cal data and the inher­ent intu­ition required in civ­il engi­neer­ing, a dis­ci­pline deeply inter­twined with the nat­ur­al world. It high­lights the indis­pens­able role of per­son­al expe­ri­ence, obser­va­tion, and a nuanced under­stand­ing of nature’s laws in devel­op­ing engi­neer­ing solu­tions that stand the test of time and ele­ments. Ulti­mate­ly, Steven­son’s lega­cy is por­trayed as a blend of inno­v­a­tive engi­neer­ing achieve­ments and an endur­ing quest to har­mo­nize human endeav­ors with the unpre­dictable dynam­ics of nature.