Archives:Tracking the History of Radar

Abstract

The objective of this volume is to track the current state of research and stimulate further work in the history of radar -- a subject that the editors and contributors believe has received far less attention than it deserves. The essays in this volume either describe the development of radar in a particular period or in a particular country, present the military and political contexts of that development, investigate the science-technology relationship on varying institutional and cultural conditions, or raise some historiographic questions by making use of a particular approach to radar history. Together with the essays on primary and secondary sources of radar history, this volume attempts to give a fair representation of the current state of scholarship and to suggest some avenues for further study.

Most of the essays are based on papers given at a workshop held at the Deutsches Museum in Munich in December 1992, organized by the editors. The workshop was made possible by a generous grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, which enabled some forty leading historians and radar professionals from the United States, Great Britain, and Germany to assemble. This may have been the first time that radar experts interested in history and historians interested in the development of radar came together for discussion. This kind of interchange is extremely important if writing in the history of radar is to progress.

The workshop originated through the efforts of the IEEE Center for the History of Electrical Engineering in 1989 to cooperate with the Smithsonian Institution, the MIT Museum, the Science Museum of London, and the Deutsches Museum Miinchen to organize an international exhibit on the history of radar. Representatives of these organizations determined that further historical research was desirable before planning an exhibit. The Deutsches Museum took the next step of organizing this workshop, with some assistance from the IEEE Center.

Citation and Link

IEEE-Rutgers Center for the History of Electrical Engineering, Tracking the History of Radar, eds. Oskar Blumtritt, Hartmut Petzold and William Aspray (Piscataway, NJ: Institute of Electrical Engineers, 1994)

Tracking the History of Radar (pdf)