Bern Dibner (18August 18976January 1988) was an electrical engineer, industrialist, and historian of science and technology. He originated two major US library collections in the

history of science and technology The history of science and technology (HST) is a field of history that examines the understanding of the natural world (science) and the ability to manipulate it (technology) at different points in time. This academic discipline also studies the c ...

Biography

Dibner was born in Lisianka, near

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe. Ky ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian invas ...

in 1897. His family was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. He moved to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

with his family at the age of 7. In 1921, he graduated from the

Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn The New York University Tandon School of Engineering (commonly referred to as Tandon) is the engineering and applied sciences school of New York University. Tandon is the second oldest private engineering and technology school in the United Sta ...

with a degree in Electrical Engineering.

Engineering career

Soon after graduating, Dibner designed and patented the first solderless electrical connectors and founded the Burndy Engineering Company in 1924. The company later became the Burndy Corporation and was bought by the French corporation Framatome Connectors International (FCI) in 1988. In 2009, Burndy was acquired and became a subsidiary of Hubbell Incorporated. Dibner died at his home in

Wilton, Connecticut Wilton is a New England town, town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the town population was 18,503. In 2017, it was the List of Connecticut locations by per capita income, sixth-wea ...

, on January 6, 1988. The "Burndy" appellation, used for both his company and the library he would found, was represents a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsAmerican Jewish League Against Communism.

History of science

In addition to electrical engineering, Dibner studied the history of technology. He was an avid collector of original scientific works and of books on the history of science, as well as thousands of portraits of various scientists. Bern Dibner also wrote a great number of books on the history of science, such as ''The Atlantic Cable'' in 1955. In 1976 he was awarded the

Sarton Medal The George Sarton Medal is the most prestigious award given by the History of Science Society. It has been awarded annually since 1955. It is awarded to an historian of science from the international community who became distinguished for "a lifeti ...

by the

History of Science Society The History of Science Society (HSS) is the primary professional society for the academic study of the history of science. It was founded in 1924 by George Sarton, David Eugene Smith, and Lawrence Joseph Henderson, primarily to support the publi ...

. Dibner, who was fascinated by the combination of art and technology in the work of

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially re ...

. He assembled a library of works about da Vinci which grew over the years as Dibner's interests expanded into the history of

electricity Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as describ ...

, the history of

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass id ...

technology, and finally the

in general.

Burndy Library

In 1941 Dibner formally established the

Burndy Library Burndy Library is one of the world's largest collections of books on the history of science and technology. History Founded in 1941 in Norwalk, Connecticut by the electrical engineer, industrialist, and historian Bern Dibner, the library holdin ...

as a separate institution "to advance scholarship in the history of science." By 1964, the Burndy Library collection totaled over 40,000 volumes and Dibner opened a new building in

Norwalk, Connecticut , image_map = Fairfield County Connecticut incorporated and unincorporated areas Norwalk highlighted.svg , mapsize = 230px , map_caption = Location in Fairfield County and Connecticut , coordinates ...

, to house the Library. In 1974, Dibner donated one-quarter of the Burndy Library's holdings to the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

to form the nucleus of a research library in the history of science and technology. It was located in the

National Museum of History and Technology The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center collects, preserves, and displays the heritage of the United States in the areas of social, political, cultural, scientific, and military history. Among the items on display is ...

(now The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center). In 1976, the Smithsonian's Dibner Library of the History of Science and Technology was established, providing the

Smithsonian Institution Libraries Smithsonian Libraries and Archives is an institutional archives and library system comprising 21 branch libraries serving the various Smithsonian Institution museums and research centers. The Libraries and Archives serve Smithsonian Institutio ...

with its first rare book collection, containing many of the major works dating from the fifteenth to the early nineteenth centuries in the history of science and technology including engineering, transportation, chemistry, mathematics, physics, electricity and astronomy. The Smithsonian Dibner Library, then numbering 35,000 volumes, was reopened after construction in spring 2010, and is located in the

National Museum of American History The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center collects, preserves, and displays the heritage of the United States in the areas of social, political, cultural, scientific, and military history. Among the items on display is t ...

on the

National Mall The National Mall is a landscaped park near the downtown area of Washington, D.C., the capital city of the United States. It contains and borders a number of museums of the Smithsonian Institution, art galleries, cultural institutions, and va ...

Washington DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

. The Smithsonian Institution Libraries have cataloged the books and manuscripts of the Dibner Library and entered the records into the international database

OCLC OCLC, Inc., doing business as OCLC, See also: is an American nonprofit cooperative organization "that provides shared technology services, original research, and community programs for its membership and the library community at large". It wa ...

and the Smithsonian's own online catalog, SIRIS.

Death and commemoration

After Bern Dibner's death in 1988, the Burndy Library moved to

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most ...

, in 1992, where it became the research library for the

Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology The Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology (1992–2006) was a research institute established at MIT, and housed in a renovated building (E56) on campus at 38 Memorial Drive, overlooking the Charles River.Charles H. BallMIT to ...

at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern t ...

. In November 2006, the complete Burndy Library collection, by then consisting of 67,000 rare volumes and a collection of scientific instruments, was donated to and became part of the

Huntington Library The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, known as The Huntington, is a collections-based educational and research institution established by Henry E. Huntington (1850–1927) and Arabella Huntington (c.1851–1924) in San Mar ...

San Marino, California San Marino is a residential city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. It was incorporated on April 25, 1913. At the 2010 census the population was 13,147. The city is one of the wealthiest places in the nation in terms of househol ...

, where it is available to scholars. The Huntington Library now offers a Dibner History of Science Program to fund fellowships, a lecture series and annual conference.

Publications

* ''Leonardo da Vinci, Military Engineer'' (1946) * ''Doctor William Gilbert'' (1947) * ''Faraday Discloses Electro-magnetic Induction'' (1949) * ''Moving the Obelisks'' (1950) * ''Galvani-Volta, A Controversy that led to the Discovery of Useful Electricity'' (1952) * ''Ten Founding Fathers of the Electrical Science'' (1954) * ''Heralds of Science'' (1955) * ''Early Electrical Machines'' (1957) * ''Agricola on Metals'' (1958) * ''The Atlantic Cable'' (1959) * ''Darwin of the Beagle'' (1960) * ''Oersted and the Discovery of Electromagnetism'' (1961) * ''The Victoria and the Triton'' (1962) * ''The New Rays of Prof. Röntgen'' (1963) * ''Alessandro Volta and the Electric Battery'' (1964) * ''Röntgen and the Discovery of X-rays'' (1968) * ''Luigi Galvani'' (1971) * ''Leonardo da Vinci, Machines and Weaponry'' (1974) * ''Benjamin Franklin - Electrician'' (1976) * ''The Burndy Library in Mitosis'' (1977)

References

External links

Biography of Bern Dibner
at

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

Biography of Bern Dibner
a
American Scientist
online at the

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dibner, Bern 1897 births 1988 deaths American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent Ukrainian Jews Jewish American historians 20th-century American engineers People from Wilton, Connecticut American historians of science Historians of technology Polytechnic Institute of New York University alumni Engineers from Connecticut Leonardo da Vinci Medal recipients 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers Historians from Connecticut 20th-century American Jews