West Virginia University Press has published Taming the Muskingum by Emory Kemp, a book that traces the history of the Muskingum River’s navigation system.
A tributary of the Ohio River and significant commercial route in the 19th century, the Muskingum River in southeastern Ohio presents a remarkable case study of how Americans have managed their waterways. In “Taming the Muskingum,” esteemed scholar Emory Kemp traces this history, emphasizing the engineering and construction aspects of river navigation and the 14 related flood control dams built under the direction of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Kemp’s study ranges from early settlement and navigation of the uncontrolled Muskingum to the state-of-the-art engineering projects undertaken during the New Deal to more recent conservation and recreation uses.
Illustrated with drawings, photographs, and maps showing many aspects of the dam and reservoir system as well as the Muskingum slackwater navigation, “Taming the Muskingum” is a rich evocation of a navigation system that is today recognized as a national Historical Civil Engineering Landmark.
Emory Kemp has been a practicing engineer for more than half a century, as both a chartered civil engineer and structural engineer in Great Britain, and elected a distinguished engineer in the American Society of Civil Engineers. He is the founder and director of the Institute for the History of Technology and Industrial Archaeology at WVU, where he was also chair and professor of civil engineering in the Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources, and a professor of history in the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences. He has served as president of the Public Works Historical Society, is a co-director of the Smithsonian Institution/WVU Joint Project for the History of Technology, and has presented numerous papers and published many articles on industrial archeology, engineering, the history of technology, structural mechanics, and public works in journals such as the�”Journal of the Society for Industrial Archaeology,” “Public Historian,” “Essays in Public Works History,” “Public Works Magazine,” and�”Canal History and Technology Proceedings.” He is the author of “Essays on the History of Transportation and Technology.”
To order this book, visit wvupress.com, phone (800) 621-2736, or visit a local bookstore.
December 2015/ 208pp/PB 978-1-940425-83-2: $49.99/ePub 978-1-940425-85-6: $49.99/ PDF 9781940425849: $49.99
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AF/12/21/15
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