Clarence Floyd Hirshfeld (January 30, 1881 – April 19, 1939) was an American electrical, mechanical and consulting engineer, educator, chief of research for the Detroit Edison Co., now

DTE Electric Company DTE Electric Company (formerly The Detroit Edison Company) was founded in 1886. DTE Electric's power generation portfolio includes renewable energy, but is primarily generated by fossil fuels. In 2021, 67.32% of electricity generated by DTE came ...

, author, and inventor, who was awarded the

John Fritz Medal The John Fritz Medal has been awarded annually since 1902 by the American Association of Engineering Societies (AAES) for "outstanding scientific or industrial achievements". The medal was created for the 80th birthday of John Fritz, who lived betw ...

posthumously in 1940.

Biography

Youth, education and early career

Hirshfeld was born in San Francisco in 1881, son of Charles Hirshfeld and Lotta (McCarthy) Hirshfeld.Winfield Scott Downs, ''Encyclopedia of American biography: New series,'' American Historical Company. 1936. p. 182 He obtained his BSc in Electrical Engineering at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Franci ...

in 1902, and later his MA in mechanical engineering from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

in 1905. At Cornell University Hirshfeld had started his career in 1903 as instructor at its Sibley College of Mechanical Engineering and Mechanic Arts, now

Cornell University College of Engineering The College of Engineering is a division of Cornell University that was founded in 1870 as the Sibley College of Mechanical Engineering and Mechanic Arts. It is one of four private undergraduate colleges at Cornell that are not statutory college ...

. There he served until 1914 working his way up to assistant professor and eventually Professor of mechanical engineering. In those days he had also started his own consultancy practice.

Further career and acknowledgment

In 1913 Hirshfeld left Cornell University for the industry. He joined the Detroit Edison Company, now

, where he was appointed chief of its research department. In

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

he took a leave of absence to serve at the

United States Ordnance Department The United States Army Ordnance Corps, formerly the United States Army Ordnance Department, is a Combat service support (United States), sustainment branch of the United States Army, headquartered at Fort Lee (Virginia), Fort Lee, Virginia. The ...

in the rank of Major and Lieutenant Colonel. Afterwards Hirshfeld continued to run his Detroit Edison Company's research department. He directed researches in a wide variety of fields including "problems dealing with the design, construction, operation and maintenance of steam-electric power plants and the operation and interconnection of the electrical system; industrial electric heating and other load-building efforts; disposal of industrial waste; electric cable deterioration: electric welding; development of electric furnaces, and new methods of developing electrical energy." From 1932 to 1939, in the last seven years of his life, he directed development of PCC streetcar as chief engineer. In his days these form of transportation was introduced in cities, such as Toronto, Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, Washington, Baltimore, Chicago, San Diego and Los Angeles.''The Edison Electric Institute Bulletin,'' Vol. 7, 1939. p. 268 In 1932 Hirshfeld obtained his Doctorate in Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.Lester Gray French. ''Machinery,'' Volume 46. 1939. page 271 In 1940 he posthumous was awarded the

Selected publications

*Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd,
Engineering thermodynamics
'' New York, D. Van Nostrand company, 1910. *Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd and Tomlinson Carlile Ulbricht,
Gas Paower
New York, Wiley, 1913. *Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd and Tomlinson Carlile Ulbricht,
Steam power
'' New York, J. Wiley & sons, inc., 1916. *Barnard, William Nichols, Frank Oakes Ellenwood, and Clarence Floyd Hirshfeld. ''Heat-power engineering.'' Volume 2. Wiley, 1935. ;Articles, a selection
https://web.archive.org/web/20171102005125/https://www.forgottenbooks.com/en/download/SizeStandardizationbyPreferredNumbers_10296778.pdf -->
*Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd "Disturbing effects of horizontal acceleration." ''Electric Railway Presidents' Conference Committee,'' 1932. *Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd, and G. U. Moran. "Performance of Modern Steam-Generating Units." ''ASME Trans.(Fuels and Steam Power Section)'' 55 (1933): 117. ;Patents, a selection:
Patent US1958577 - Apparatus for dust separation
1934
Patent US2010668 - Tire for rail vehicles
1935
Patent US2124350 - Wheel assembly
1938
Patent US1923147 - Electric cable and method of operating the same
1933
Patent US2207151 - Brake shoe
1940
Patent US2243068 - Braking system
1941

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hirshfeld, Clarence Floyd 1881 births 1939 deaths American electrical engineers American mechanical engineers University of California alumni Cornell University alumni Cornell University faculty People from San Francisco John Fritz Medal recipients Engineers from California