Paul Weidlinger (22 December 1914 – 5 September 1999) was a Hungarian

structural engineer Structural engineers analyze, design, plan, and research List of structural elements, structural components and structural systems to achieve design goals and ensure the safety and comfort of users or occupants. Their work takes account mainly of ...

. Paul was born in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

on December 22, 1914. He attended the

Brno University of Technology Brno University of Technology (BUT; Czech: ''Vysoké učení technické v Brně'', VUT) is a university located in Brno, Czech Republic. Being founded in 1899 and initially offering a single course in civil engineering, it grew to become a maj ...

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

followed by Swiss Polytechnic Institute,

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

. After his graduation in 1937 Weidlinger went to

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

looking for work. Whilst sitting in his room at 3 Bedford Square reading the telephone directory he came across the name of

László Moholy-Nagy László Moholy-Nagy (; ; born László Weisz; July 20, 1895 – November 24, 1946) was a Kingdom of Hungary, Hungarian painter and photographer as well as a professor in the Bauhaus school. He was highly influenced by Constructivism (art), con ...

. He decided to

cold call Cold calling is the solicitation of business from potential customers who have had no prior contact with the salesperson conducting the call. It is an attempt to convince potential customers to purchase the salesperson's product or service. Gene ...

him and was successful in being taken on as a draftsman. During his stay in London he visited the Paris World Fair and particularly appreciated the Pavilion des Temps Nouveaux, (Pavilion of New Times), a tent pavilion designed by

Le Corbusier Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , ; ), was a Swiss-French architectural designer, painter, urban planner and writer, who was one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture ...

and

Pierre Jeanneret Pierre Jeanneret (22 March 1896 – 4 December 1967) was a Swiss architect who collaborated with his cousin, Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (who assumed the pseudonym Le Corbusier), for about twenty years. Early life Arnold-André-Pierre Jean ...

. From April to August 1938 he was working for Le Corbusier. After leaving Europe in 1939 he worked and taught in

La Paz La Paz, officially Nuestra Señora de La Paz (Aymara language, Aymara: Chuqi Yapu ), is the seat of government of the Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bolivia. With 755,732 residents as of 2024, La Paz is the List of Bolivian cities by populati ...

, Bolivia. In 1943 he moved on to the United States where he started working for Charles Wohlstetter designing modular aircraft hangars that could be assembled quickly. With Charles' brother

Albert Wohlstetter Albert James Wohlstetter (December 19, 1913 – January 10, 1997) was an American political scientist noted for his influence on U.S. nuclear strategy during the Cold War. He and his wife Roberta Wohlstetter, an accomplished historian and intell ...

and Weidlinger worked at the

United States Housing Authority The United States Housing Authority, or USHA, was a Alphabet agencies, federal agency created during 1937 within the United States Department of the Interior by the Housing Act of 1937 as part of the New Deal. It was designed to lend money to the ...

applying these modular principles to domestic residential buildings. He started his own practice,

Weidlinger Associates Weidlinger Associates, Inc., was a U.S.-based structural engineering firm that designs and rehabilitates buildings, bridges, and infrastructure and provides special services in applied science, forensics, and physical security. Weidlinger's client ...

, in 1949. He designed his home, the Paul and Madeleine Weidlinger House, in

Wellfleet, Massachusetts Wellfleet is a New England town, town in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States, and is located halfway between the "tip" and "elbow" of Cape Cod. The town had a population of 3,566 at the 2020 United ...

. The house was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2014. He and his first wife, Madeleine (née Freidli, d. mid-1970s), had a son Tom, born c. 1953, and an older daughter. Paul Weidlinger died on 5 September 1999.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weidlinger, Paul 1914 births 1999 deaths American structural engineers 20th-century American engineers Hungarian emigrants to the United States