H. J. Dana

H. J. Dana was an experimental-engineering specialist at the State College of Washington when he collaborated with mechanical-engineering instructor W. A. Pearl on The Use of Ropes and Tackle. Issued in 1922 as Engineering Bulletin No. 8 by the college’s Engineering Experiment Station, the manual gathered practical information that its introduction described as scattered across trades and industries. Dana and Pearl organized the material into illustrated sections on knots, splices, hitches, lashings, tackle sets, hoists, transmission cables, and textile and wire-rope data. Tables and diagrams give the volume the character of a working technical reference, while the opening institutional pages connect it to the station’s public-service mission. Catalog records expand Dana’s name to Homer J. Dana and Pearl’s to William Armour Pearl. The Use of Ropes and Tackle is consequently a joint engineering publication, shaped by both authors’ roles and by the research-and-extension program that issued it.