Robert Henry Thurston was the first professor of mechanical engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology (in 1871). There he established Stevens’ mechanical engineering curriculum. Historians credit Thurston with establishing the first US mechanical engineering laboratory for conducting funded research at an academic institution for higher learning. He was the first president (1880-82) of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Wikipedia
The definitive Wikipedia entry for Robert Henry Thurston. Wikipedia is the biggest multilingual free-content encyclopedia on the Internet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Henry_Thurston
