Mechanical Engineering at the University of Arkansas

Mechanical engineering at the University of Arkansas developed into a program and a department in the late nineteenth century as the state government slowly began to understand the importance of the subject as part of the land-grant college's mission. In the late 1800s, professors from various departments taught in the mechanical engineering program, but that would change, as the department began to retain long-term professors and instructors in the first half of the twentieth century. Department heads such as Birton N. Wilson and Russell G. Paddock would set the example of commitment required to run a stable program.

After the end of World War II, the program adjusted to accommodate the competitiveness that developed between the United States and the Soviet Union by offering courses in new ways. Curriculum would be only part of that adjustment as the College of Engineering competed for public and private money to begin supplemental institutes and to construct additional buildings for research. After moving into its own building in the 1960s, the mechanical engineering program successfully developed into one that balanced the needs of faculty research with the needs of both undergraduate and graduate students. The support of groups such as the Arkansas Academy of Mechanical Engineers continues to be important for the department to carry out its mission throughout the twenty-first century and beyond.

William Jordan Patty is currently working on a master of library science degree in the College of Information Studies, University of Maryland-College Park. He received a master of arts degree in history from the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville in 2003 and a bachelor of arts degree from the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, in 1998.