The latter half of the 19th century . . .

"The Centennial Exposition in 1876 in Philadelphia was responsible for a national quickening in mechanical matters and for a growing sense of latent power. The big central Corliss engine of Machinery Hall was a splendid object lesson and this Exposition was signalized by the single valve automatic engine with flywheel governor designed by John C. Hoadley, by Professor Sweet's design of the Straight-Line engine, and by a series of boiler tests by Charles E. Emery, Charles T. Porter and Joseph Belknap. These all marked epochs in the engineering history of the United States. Moreover, in the fifteen years since the Civil War the enormous increase in size and productivity of industrial plants had just begun. The Land Grant colleges had their graduates of a dozen years practising their profession and by the natural processes of promotion the products of the older schools of engineering had attained positions of trust and influence."

-- Frederick Remsen Hutton, Sc.D., A History of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers from 1880 to 1915 (New York: ASME, 1915)