Volume 20.1 (2014)

My lifelong liberal inclinations lead me to welcome every prospect of international cooperation, but my acquaintance with Communist tactics makes me suspicious that there might be political motives behind seemingly innocent scholarly ventures.

Melvin Kranzberg to Eugene Ferguson, 25 June 1965

[…] about the lack of sufficiently widespread foreign representation at the [SHOT] Critical Issues Conference, if you want a genuine Marxist historian of technology, you might invite Professor Eugeniusz Olszewski.

Melvin Kranzberg to Carroll Pursell, 13 June 1978

This essay reviews the development of ICOHTEC from its origin in 1968 to the occasion of the joint symposium with TICCIH in Finland in 2010. It presents the Committee as evolving from an attempt to build intellectual bridges between East and West in the period of the Cold War, with an emphasis on national representation through active societies and groups, to the present thriving society of individual members engaged in advancing the history of technology. Unlike TICCIH, with its concentration on the conservation of industrial monuments, it has always placed most weight on the academic understanding of the history of technology, although by no means unconcerned about conservation and environmental issues.

ICOHTEC was established soon after the years of the Khruschev thaw in Russia. The birth of ICOHTEC in 1968 coincided with some notable events, one of which was the ‘Prague Spring’. A Russian historian of technology, Semyon Shukhardin, was one of the organizers of ICOHTEC. In 1976, the 6th ICOHTEC Symposium with the theme ‘Technology and Society’ was held in Kaluga, USSR. ICOHTEC symposia and its journal ICON have influenced the academic research work of Russian scientists. Unfortunately an obstacle for Russian authors in achieving fullblooded  international  contacts  remains  as  their  work  continues  to  be  published mainly in the Russian language. Another problem is that only a few of the Russian historians of technology have the opportunity to attend the symposia. Recent social and economic reforms in Russia still have not improved the financial welfare of scientists.

In his 1959 article on the history of technology, Howard Mumford Jones demanded that the field should devote itself more intensively to the examination of failed innovations. The analysis of failure, he argued, was of special importance for the understanding of technical development and could pave the way towards a more comprehensive, more realistic description of technological change. Furthermore, if this change was analysed exclusively based on successful developments, a distorted picture of the historical process emerges: technical development appears to have followed a straight rational path, hurrying along from success to success. In the last five decades, Mumford’s request was repeated with some regularity, but unfortunately, failure studies still have played a more or less minor role within the field. Only in the late 1980s did a couple of scholars begin to turn to the analysis of innovational  failure, demonstrating  the  benefits  that  an  examination  of ‘blots’ can bring. This essay presents the development of failure studies in the past decades, summarises  their  outcomes  and, last  but  not  least, discusses  the  role  that ICOHTEC played in the emergence and advancement of this field of research.

Since the large session on music and technology at the ICOHTEC Symposium in Budapest in 1996 there have been several sessions at ICOHTEC symposia which have dealt with topics on technology, sound and music. Apart from the Budapest session this paper concentrates on only two which were particularly rewarding: the sessions in Glasgow, 2011 and in Manchester, 2013. Between 1996 and 2013 the field  has  grown  with  many  new  researchers  from  the  history  of technology, musicology, science and technology studies, ethnography, cultural and media studies and adjacent disciplines entering the field. This has resulted in a vibrant exchange of ideas and concepts which have yielded an impressive array of first-rate studies. From  mid-1995  ICOHTEC  has  played  an  important  role  in  fostering  sound studies. Many scholars now established in academia have in their formative stages found inspiration in ICOHTEC sessions on sound and music but have, in turn, also  provided  significant  input  into  this  field  and  into  ICOHTEC`s  efforts  to advance sound studies.

The study of the history and technology of gunpowder and its national and international significance in civil and military life has been rescued from neglect by the sessions held over the years under the auspices of ICOHTEC. This is a bold claim, but since our first meeting at the 22 nd Symposium in Bath in 1994, much has been achieved: an informal fellowship of gunpowder historians has been established; two well-reviewed books have been published, and the first of these re-printed; individual scholars have had their work published in appropriate journals; and debates have been sparked that still continue, especially in the matter of saltpetre. None of this could have been achieved without the support of ICOHTEC, whose strengths may be defined as having provided continuity, made evident by the celebration of its 40 th Symposium: authenticity, as invitations to participate in symposia that might otherwise have been viewed with suspicion have been accepted; inclusivity, a willingness to provide a home for new studies that may be unacceptable elsewhere; mobility, as our peripatetic society has met in fascinating places, enabling us to  investigate  significant  gunpowder  works  as  at  Barcarena  near  Lisbon; and sociability, as our symposia have over the years uplifted not only the mind but also the spirit.

Since 2006, the symposium on the social history of military technology has been a regular feature of ICOHTEC’s annual meetings. It overlapped, and to a certain degree subsequently incorporated, the earlier gunpowder symposium organized by Brenda J. Buchanan, although, of course, the gunpowder symposium covered many non-military topics as well. Participation in the symposium on the social history of military technology has steadily increased over the years, revealing the existence, and perhaps helping to create, a community of scholars active in this area. How this vibrant  community  originated  and  came  to  play  so  significant  a  role  in ICOHTEC is the subject of this essay.

In the more than forty years of its existence, ICOHTEC has been an arena in which the topic science-technology relationships was and still is largely present. This often discussed topic has a special place and plays a particular role in the History of Technology field. The technical and scientific aspects, as well as the economic, social and political ones are present in many papers delivered in ICOHTEC symposia. They are often case studies, but also broader studies with a holistic approach. Science-technology relationships are present in all technical fields, including energy, materials, information and communication, transportation, machines and machine sciences, medicine, military technology, scientific instruments, etc.They concern research, invention and innovation, production, trade and education, as well as the individuals and institutions involved in these fields and processes. This essay dealing with science-technology relationships in ICOHTEC’s works is not exhaustive, but it allows a general view concerning ICOHTEC’s contributions in the field.

‘Playing with Technology’ is quite a young research topic within ICOHTEC, having been launched at ICOHTEC’s 2007 symposium in Copenhagen.The goal was, and still is, to investigate mutual influences of technology and play, as well as the societal impact of this large field of technology. The history of technology has focused on the relation of technology and work and its positive and negative outcomes for many decades. The presentation and application of technology for playing offers new perspectives on human/technology relations. This essay introduces the subject with examples from technology-based fairground amusements, technical toys and sports in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It analyses ICOHTEC’s contribution to the scientific development of the topic, and also develops perspectives for future research.

In 1982, in Smolenice, Czechoslavakia, and in the wake of the 1970 energy crises, ICOHTEC decided to focus on ‘energy in history’ at its 1984 symposium. The meeting in Lerbach, Germany, inaugurated energy as a subject of interest in successive symposia, with sessions regularly addressing energy resources, production, transportation and use. Tangentially, a closely related interest in the environment emerged at ICOHTEC symposia, and technology and the environment appeared as a subject in its own right. In 2000, these related topics all came together in Prague, where the symposium theme was ‘technological landscapes: energy, transport and environment.’ That same year, ICOHTEC members joined with historians of technology in the American Society for the History of Technology and with environmental historians to form Envirotech, a new organisation ‘bridging the histories of environment and technology’, and books and articles on the subject emerged from the work of ICOHTEC scholars. Subsequently, energy, technology and the environment continues to be an important and on-going subject of discussion at ICOHTEC symposia.

The annual meetings of the International Committee for the History of Technology are conceived primarily as forums of scholarly discussion between historians of technology from different countries. However, since ICOHTEC’s founding in 1968, members have always believed that a good social atmosphere facilitates and tightens scholarly interaction and collaboration. Thus, excursions, banquets and musical events are hallmarks of our symposia.The organisers of each meeting strive to make them more attractive by offering a rich social and cultural programme. Even field trips to historic mines and factories, which have an important educational element, stimulate closer interpersonal relationships among participants. The same can be said of dinners and receptions, which like other social events, often lead to long-lasting friendships.

Most scholarly conferences include some time for relaxation and entertainment, but few can boast a regular jazz evening with musicians who are also society members. Since Hans-Joachim Braun organised the first configuration of what would become the Email Special in Budapest in 1996, these jazz evenings have become a regular feature of ICOHTEC meetings. It is fitting that music would find an ongoing presence in the annual ICOHTEC symposia. As a scholarly society founded on international cooperation and interdisciplinary exchange of ideas, ICOHTEC has always embraced openness, and what better way to communicate across cultures than through the universal language of music? It is also fitting that jazz music would become an integral part of the events of a society rooted in European culture, since Europe was where American jazz musicians found more appreciative audiences than those in the United States during the racially divided Jim Crow era of the 1920s through early 1960s. But jazz has not been the only music enjoyed at our symposia, as this paper reveals. Tracing the history of music at ICOHTEC conferences, from the German Dixieland band on the steamboat ride along the Elbe in 1987 to the first Email Special gig in a Hungarian jazz club a decade later and the subsequent re-configurations of the group over the years and across four continents, to the Bach organ recital of the late W. David Lewis in a church in Prague, to the blues power duo of Kinney and Ampuja, this is the story of how this musical tradition has evolved, how the local organisers have always managed to provide the necessary equipment – including a vibraphone! – and how ICOHTEC’s musical events exemplify international cooperation and the collegial atmosphere of our society.

David Lucsko
The Business of Speed: The Hot Rod Industry in America, 1915-1990 (Alison Kreitzer), p. 146

Dolly Jørgensen, Finn Arne Jørgensen, Sara B. Pritchard, eds.
New Natures: Joining Environmental History with Science and Technology Studies (Stephen H. Cutcliffe) p. 148

Eran Ben-Joseph
Rethinking a Lot: The Design and Culture of Parking (Owen Gutfreund), p.150

Tanya Sheehan
Doctored: The Medicine of Photography in Nineteenth-Century America (Annie Moore), p. 151

Leslie Tomory
Progressive Enlightenment. The Origin of the Gaslight Industry, 1870-1820 (Francesco Gerali), p. 153

Roland Wenzlhuemer
Connecting the Nineteenth-Century World: The Telegraph and Globalization (David Hochfelder), p. 155

Artemis Yagou
Fragile Innovation: Episodes in Greek Design History (Constantin Canavas), p. 157

Paul R. Josephson
Would Trotsky Wear a Bluetooth? Technological Utopianism under Socialism, 1917-1989 (Nikolaus Katzer), p. 160

Per Lundin, Niklas Stenlås, Joham Gribbe, eds.
Science for Welfare and Warfare. Technology and State Initiative in Cold War Sweden (Petter Wulff), p. 164

Markus Krajewski, trans., Peter Krapp
Paper Machines: About Cards & Catalogs, 1548-1929 (Anne Hiller Clark), p. 166

Joan Fitzpatrick, ed.
Renaissance Food from Rabelais to Shakespeare: Culinary Readings and Culinary Histories (Stephen Bamforth), p. 167

Douglas Summers Stay
Machinamenta: The Thousand Year Quest to Build a Creative Machine (Gwendolyn Brown), p. 169

Andre Millard
Beatlemania: Technology, Business, and Teen Culture in Cold War America (Alexander B. Magoun), p. 170

Gabrielle Hecht, ed.
Entangled Geographies: Empire and Technopolitics in the Global Cold War (Mats Fridlund), p. 173

Joseph J. Corn
User Unfriendly: Consumer Struggles with Personal Technologies, from Clocks and Sewing Machines to Cars and Computers (Jesika Butler), p. 174

Nina Möllers, Karin Zachmann, eds.
Past and Present Energy Societies: How Energy Connects Politics, Technologies and Cultures (Jytte Thorndahl), p. 176

Tony Slaven
British Shipbuilding 1500-2010 (Fred Walker), p. 179

Tony Slaven, Hugh Murphy
Crossing the Bar: An Oral History of the British Shipbuilding, Ship Repairing and Marine Engine  Building Industries in the Age of Decline, 1956-1990 (Ian Buxton), p. 180

Mark Denny
The Science of Navigation: From Dead Reckoning to GPS (John Dieck), p. 182