Exploding Steamboats, Senate Debates, and Technical Reports: The Convergence of Technology, Politics, and Rhetoric in the Steamboat Bill of 1838 [Paperback]

By 1838, over two thousand Americans had been killed and many hundreds injured by exploding steam engines on steamboats. After calls for a solution in two State of the Union addresses, a Senate Select Committee met to consider an investigative report from the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, the first federally funded investigation into a technical.

CHAPTER 1. Steamboat Politics and Steamboat Society
 New York Harbor, May 15, 1824, 7:00 PM
 Four Days LaterWashington City, May 19, 1824

CHAPTER 2. Steamboat Technology
 High-Pressure Steam Engines and Hulls that Ride On the Water
 What Could Go Wrong with the Boiler Technology
 Problems Operating a Problem-Prone Technology
 February 24, 1830, Memphis Tennessee, Early Morning
 Washington City, May 4, 1830Two and a Half Months Later

CHAPTER 3. Steamboats, The Presidency, and Public Opinion
 Red River, May 19, 1833, Early on a Spring Sunday Morning
 December 3, 1833President Jacksons State of the Union Message to Congress
 But What About the Public Pressure for Steamboat Safety?
 The Franklin Institute ReportsA Reasoned Technical Response to Catastrophe
 Traditional Technical Writing of the EraCommunications Received by the Committee of
 the Franklin Institute on the Explosion of Steam Boilers (1832)
 Report of the Committee of the Franklin Institute of the State of Pennsylvania for the
 Promotion of the Mechanic Arts, on the Explosions of Steam-Boilers, Part I, Containing
 the First Report of Experiments Made by the Committee for the Treasury Department of
 the U. States (1836)
 General Report on the Explosions of Steam-Boilers by a Committee of thelc=