Vannevar Bush papers

Vannevar Bush was born on March 11, 1890, in Everett, Massachusetts, to Richard Perry Bush, a Universalist clergyman, and Emma Linwood Paine Bush. After attending high school in Chelsea, Massachusetts, Bush received both his Bachelor and his Master of Science degrees from Tufts College in 1913. His first job was with the Testing Department of General Electric Company, and, in 1914, he joined the Inspection Department of the US Navy. Later that year he returned to Tufts as an instructor of mathematics. After a year's study at MIT and Harvard, Bush received a Doctor of Engineering degree in 1916. At that time Harvard and MIT awarded this degree jointly. He returned to Tufts as an assistant professor of electrical engineering. The same year he married Phoebe Davis.

At Tufts Bush became a consultant to the American Research and Development Corporation (AMRAD), a company that developed radio devices. When World War I started, Bush went to New London, Connecticut, to conduct anti-submarine research for AMRAD. There he developed a magnetic device for detecting submarines, but the device was never used by the Navy. Bush was a civilian during World War I, but served as a lieutenant commander in the Naval Reserve from 1924 to 1932.

Bush returned to MIT in 1919 to become an associate professor of electrical power transmission and by 1923 he was made a full professor. His teaching duties were reduced when he became the director of graduate study and of the Research Division of the Department of Electrical Engineering. During this time Bush continued to act as a consultant for AMRAD and, in association with Laurence K. Marshall, he worked on projects which eventually led to the founding of the Raytheon Company and the Metals and Controls Corporation.

With the help of several MIT graduate students, Bush designed the first in a series of analog machines; called the Product Integraph, it was an early development in the field of computation. Bush and Professor Harold L. Hazen built a version of the machine with greater capacity in 1927. Bush completed his best known machine, the Differential Analyzer, in 1931. It solved sixth-order differential equations or three simultaneous second-order differential equations and served as a prototype for other machines. At the same time, under Bush's guidance, Hazen and H. H. Spencer developed the Network Analyzer to use in the simulation of power systems.

By 1941 Bush's efforts led to the development of the Rockefeller Differential Analyzer which proved more versatile because punched tape controlled this 100-ton giant. It was fully operational by 1942 and was in constant use during World War II for the computation of Navy range tables and studies of fire-control systems, radar antennas, and other critical subjects.

During his years at MIT Bush made other scientific contributions including improvements in the design of vacuum tubes and four-engine bombers and studies on transients in machines and on dielectric phenomena. He also invented such electronic machines as a justifying typewriter, a rapid selector, and the cinema integraph.

Bush continued to be active in MIT's administration and from 1932 to 1938 he served as vice president and the first dean of the School of Engineering. During the administration of President Karl T. Compton, Bush became a leader in modernizing the curriculum and advancing research. In 1939 Bush became a lifetime member of MIT's governing body, the Corporation, and from 1957 to 1959 he served as chair of the Corporation and then as honorary chair until 1971.

Bush left MIT in 1938 to assume the presidency of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, DC, a position he held until 1955. During his tenure as president, Bush coordinated the Carnegie Institution's research program to work in closer cooperation with other educational and research agencies.

Bush became a member of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) in 1938 and was chair from 1939 until 1941. Bush held discussions with James B. Conant, Frank B. Jewett, Karl T. Compton, and Richard C. Tolman that dealt with the lack of technological preparedness of the US. He asked the secretary of NACA to begin preparing a proposal to establish a National Defense Research Committee (NDRC) that would address the problem. Before the proposal could be formally submitted to Congress, the urgency of the situation compelled Bush to approach President Roosevelt directly with the plan.

The NDRC came into official existence on June 27, 1940, with Bush as its chair. In 1941 the NDRC, an Advisory Council, and a Committee on Medical Research became branches of the newly created Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) and Bush assumed its directorship. In addition, Bush was chair of the Joint New Weapons Committee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Through the OSRD, Bush mobilized the country's scientific efforts, initiated research programs in cooperation with the Army and Navy, advised the President on the status of scientific research and development, and supported continuing research on the instrumentalities and materials of war and in the field of medicine. The OSRD administered the atomic bomb project until 1943. In all, before activities ceased in 1947, the OSRD developed over two hundred weapons in addition to making contributions to the fields of medicine, physics, and chemistry, among others.

In the fall of 1944, President Roosevelt asked Bush to use his experience with the OSRD to make recommendations on government policies for combating disease, supporting research, developing scientific and technical talents and diffusing scientific information. Bush's report, Science, the Endless Frontier, issued in July 1945, drew upon studies made by scientists, engineers, and educators, and made specific proposals for the consolidation and utilization of the nation's scientific skills. Bush's treatise eventually led to the establishment of the National Science Foundation in 1947.

After the war, Bush remained actively involved with governmental administration of scientific research. In 1946, Bush served for a year as chair of the Joint Research and Development Board of the War and Navy departments. This Board was replaced by the Research and Development Board of the National Military Establishment and Bush continued as chair until 1948. For two years, starting in 1953, Bush was a member of the National Science Foundation's Advisory Committee on Government-University Relationships.

After his eighteen-year tenure in Washington, DC, Bush returned to Belmont, Massachusetts, and renewed his association with MIT. In 1965 the Center for Materials and Engineering was named the Vannevar Bush Building to honor his service to MIT Bush also renewed his interest in inventing when he returned to Massachusetts. He built a machine shop in the basement of his Belmont home and worked on hydraulic pumps and motors, free piston engines, and steam engines. He developed medical devices such as a silicone rubber valve for the heart and a gold valve for the treatment of hydrocephalus. His interests expanded into the development and testing of hydrofoil boats, as well.

The industrial aspects of science also concerned Bush. From 1947 to 1962 he was a director of American Telephone and Telegraph. In 1949 he became a member of the board of the pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. and served as chair after 1957. He was one of the founders and the executive chair of the Graphic Arts Research Foundation.

Bush died at his home in Belmont on June 28, 1974, at the age of eighty-four.

See also Jerome Wiesner's biography of Vannevar Bush in National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoirs, vol. 50, 1979.