Henry Petroski is the Aleksandar S. Vesic Professor of Civil Engineering and Professor of History at Duke University. His books include To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design (1985), The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance (1990), and To Forgive Design: Understanding Failure (2012).
ARTICLES FEATURING HENRY

No Success Like Failure
ON MAY 8, 1842, A TRAIN loaded with passengers from Versailles to Paris in the wake of a birthday celebration for ...
