Inventing modern : growing up with X-Rays, skyscrapers, and tailfins / by John H. Lienhard

Lienhard, John H.

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Language: English

Published by Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2003

0195160320 / 9780195160321

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Seller: MW Books, New York, NY, U.S.A.MW Books

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Fine cloth copy in an equally fine dw, now mylar-sleeved. Particularly and surprisingly well-preserved; tight, bright, clean and especially sharp-cornered.; 292 pages; Physical desc. : ix, 292 p. : ill. , ports. ; 25 cm. Includes index. Includes bibliographical references and index. Subject: Lienhard, John H. --Childhood and youth --Material culture --Social aspects --United States --History --20th century --Technology --Science. Summary: Modern is a word much used, but hard to pin down. In Inventing Modern, John H. Lienhard uses that word to capture the furious rush of newness in the first half of 20th-century America. An unexpected world emerges from under the more familiar Modern. Beyond the airplanes, radios, art deco, skyscrapers, Fritz Lang's Metropolis, Buck Rogers, the culture of the open road--Burma Shave, Kerouac, and White Castles--lie driving forces that set this account of Modern apart. One force, says Lienhard, was a new concept of boyhood--the risk-taking, hands-on savage inventor. Driven by an admiration of recklessness, America developed its technological empire with stunning speed. Bringing the airplane to fruition in so short a time, for example, were people such as Katherine Stinson, Lincoln Beachey, Amelia Earhart, and Charles Lindbergh. The rediscovery of mystery powerfully drove Modern as well. X-Rays, quantum mechanics, and relativity theory had followed electricity and radium. Here we read how, with reality seemingly altered, hope seemed limitless. Lienhard blends these forces with his childhood in the brave new world. The result is perceptive, engaging, and filled with surprise. Whether he talks about Alexander Calder (an engineer whose sculptures were exercises in materials science) or that wacky paean to flight, Flying Down to Rio, unexpected detail emerges from every tile of this large mosaic. Inventing Modern is a personal book that displays, rather than defines, an age that ended before most of us were born. It is an engineer's homage to a time before the bomb and our terrible loss of confidence--a time that might yet rise again out of its own postmodern ashes. 1 Kg.

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Title
Inventing modern : growing up with X-Rays, skyscrapers, and tailfins / by John H. Lienhard
Author
Lienhard, John H.
Publisher
Oxford : Oxford University Press
Publication year
2003
Dust jacket
Dust Jacket Included
Binding
Hardcover
Language
English
ISBN 10
0195160320
ISBN 13
9780195160321
Edition
First Edition.
Item weight
1 kilogram

MW Books

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With a permanent inventory of 250,000 hand-picked volumes and with publication dates ranging from the 1500s to the present, MW Books has much to offer the conscientious bibliophile as well as the avid reader. Travel and Exploration, European Literature, Modern Firsts, 19th Century Illustrated, Asian & African Political History, British Topography, Regional Art Reference, Signed & Gift editions etc. etc.; we'd love to hear from you - let us know if we can help in any way.

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