For those interested in America’s industrial and technological history, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is a prime source of information, affording access to thousands of patent documents dating back to the eighteenth century. However, the sheer volume of information and its highly technical nature can overwhelm the researcher.

American Bridge Patents: The First Century (17901890),the newest offering of the West Virginia University Press, makes the Patent Office’s wealth of information more understandable for both amateur bridge enthusiasts and professionals alike.

As Dr. Emory Kemp, the editor ofAmerican Bridge Patentsand a retired WVU professor of civil engineering and history, states,The prospect of writing even a brief history of the American patent law process is a daunting one. The problem lies not with any lack of data on the evolution of the Patent Office, but how to present an abundance of information in an insightful and engaging manner.

Yet, despite these difficulties, the book succeeds in combining depth with readability. Two decades of research went into its development.

Dr. Larry Sypolt of the Institute for the History of Technology and Industrial Archeology at WVU and a contributor to the book calls itthe largest and most comprehensive collection of official bridge-patent information ever published.

Rather than treating bridge patents as isolated documents,American Bridge Patentsexplores how they are interconnected. In the book’s first essay, Kemp highlights how they exemplify engineering trends of the period. In the second, Shelley Birdsong-Maddex, associate director of Foundation Relations at Carnegie Mellon University , uses them to illustrate the history of the Patent Office itself. In the third, Eric DeLony, chief of the Historic American Engineering Record, cites them in demonstrating how Patent Office documents are useful to the researcher. Against this backdrop, bridge patents take on a new significance.

American Bridge Patentsalso aims to spur future scholarship in the field of engineering history. To this end, Sypolt provides a step-by-step guide for navigating the Patent Office’s online database of documents; a comprehensive list of bridge patents is also provided, further aiding the research process. A gallery of color-rendered patent drawings never before published rounds out the book.

Kemp’s previous publication with us,The Proceedings of the International Conference on Historic Bridges,’was the first book about bridge engineering that we published,said Sherry McGraw, marketing director of the WVU Press.Now,American Bridge Patents’expands on the topic. It’s a fitting addition to our university press’s lineup of scholarly works.

For more information, visitwww.wvupress.comor call 1-866-WVUPRESS.