Max Mark Frocht (3 June 1894July 1974) was a Polish-American engineer and educator. He was a professor at the

Illinois Institute of Technology The Illinois Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Illinois Tech and IIT, is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Tracing its history to 1890, the present name was adopted upon the m ...

and founder of the Laboratory for Experimental Stress Analysis.

Education

Max Mark Frocht had moved from

Congress Poland Congress Poland or Congress Kingdom of Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It was established w ...

to the United States in 1912, settling in

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

where he worked as a machinist and tool maker. In 1916 he enrolled in Mechanical Engineering at the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

, earning his B.S. in 1920. He received an M.S. in physics in 1925 from the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The university is composed of seventeen undergraduate and graduate schools and colle ...

, before retiring to the University of Michigan to earn a Ph.D. in 1931 with

Stephen Timoshenko Stepan Prokopovich Timoshenko (, ; , ; – May 29, 1972), later known as Stephen Timoshenko, was a Ukrainian and later an American engineer and academician. He is considered to be the father of modern engineering mechanics. An inventor an ...

Research and career

Frocht was an authority on

photoelasticity In materials science, photoelasticity describes changes in the optical properties of a material under mechanical deformation. It is a property of all dielectric media and is often used to experimentally determine the stress distribution in a ...

and his two volume work, Photoelasticity, is a classic text in the field. He worked at the

Carnegie Institute of Technology Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...

between his B.S. and M.S. as an instructor and returned to the

as a professor in 1931 after completing his Ph.D. Frocht served on the

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines and mechanism (engineering), mechanisms that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and engineering mathematics, mathematics principl ...

faculty of the

from 1946 to 1960 and then directed the university's Laboratory for Experimental Stress Analysis. Frocht was an important early member of the Society for Experimental Stress Analysis (now the

Society for Experimental Mechanics Society for Experimental Mechanics (SEM) is a professional organization for engineers and scientists studying the design and implementation of experiments to characterize materials, structures, and systems. Formed in 1943 as the Society for Experim ...

) and had a longstanding frequent rivalry with fellow IIT faculty members and SESA member August J. Durelli, which was seen to contribute to the progress of the photoelastic method. It was therefore ironic that upon Frocht's retirement from IIT, the subsequent two directors of the IIT Laboratory for Experimental Stress Analysis, James W. Dally and Cesar Sciammarella, were both students of Durelli. Frocht was named the third Honorary Member of the Society for Experimental Stress Analysis (SESA) (later the

(SEM)) in 1959, a position held until death in 1974. He is the only Honorary Member of the society to not also be

Fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

. When SESA introduced the rank of Fellow in 1975 all living Honorary Members of the society were named in the first class of Fellow, but Frocht had passed away the year before. Since 1975, in the extremely rare case that a new Honorary Member is named who is not already a Fellow that automatically also receive that title. The

initiated the M.M Frocht Award in his honor in 1967 to recognize outstanding achievement as an educator in the field of experimental mechanics, with Frocht being the inaugural recipient in 1968.

Awards and recognition

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Honorary Member (1959-1974) *

Murray Murray may refer to: Businesses * Murray (bicycle company), an American bicycle manufacturer * Murray Motor Car Company, an American car manufacturer * Murrays, an Australian bus company * Murray International Trust, a Scottish investment trus ...

Lecture and Award (1959) *

Frocht Award (1968)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Frocht, Max American engineers University of Michigan alumni University of Pittsburgh alumni Illinois Institute of Technology 1894 births 1974 deaths Emigrants from Congress Poland to the United States