engineering

George M. Totten

George M. Totten is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand George M. Totten rather than just read about it. In short: George Muirson Totten (1808-1884) was a civil engineer who built several important canals and railroads in the mid 1800s. He was the chief engineer for the Panama Canal Railway, which preceded the Panama Canal by almost 60 years.

Key takeaways

George M. Totten belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect George M. Totten to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of George M. Totten from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

George Muirson Totten (1808-1884) was a civil engineer who built several important canals and railroads in the mid 1800s. He was the chief engineer for the Panama Canal Railway, which preceded the Panama Canal by almost 60 years. Originally from Connecticut, at age 20 he began working as an engineer, and was involved with the construction of several canals: the Juniata, the Farmington, and the Delaware and Raritan Canals. After steam locomotives became commercially viable, he entered railroad construction in 1835, and worked on building railroads in Pennsylvania. Between 1840 and 1843 he was head construction engineer on the road connecting Gastonia and Raleigh, North Carolina. From 1843 to 1848, along with his engineering partner, John Cresson Trautwine, he worked for the government of New Granada (present day Colombia/Panama), on the Canal del Dique, which connected the Magdalena River with Cartagena harbor. In 1850 Totten and Trautwine became the chief engineers for the Panama Railroad, the first railway line to connect the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Construction of the 47.6 mile (76.6 km) long railroad lasted five years under difficult circumstances, and was completed in 1855. It is estimated that perhaps 6,000 workers died in the construction of the railroad, primarily from disease. In the summer of 1852 alone, 51 engineers, surveyors, and draftsmen - nearly all of Totten's staff - died of cholera. Totten himself had an attack of yellow fever so severe that his companions built a coffin for him at one point. After its completion, he remained in Panama until 1875 as the railroad's head engineer. In 1851, Totten was elected as a member of the American Philosophical Society. After the Panama Railroad was complete, in 1857 he conducted a survey for a canal which could cross Panama from the Atlantic Ocean at Limon Bay to the Pacific Ocean at Panama City. In 1879, founder of the French Panama Canal Company Ferdinand de Lesseps appointed Totten as the head of the company's engineers, however by 1880 Totten had retired. Totten also built the first railroad in Venezuela, from Caracas to La Guayra. For his work, General Guzman Blanco, ruler of Venezuela, gave him a gold medal. French Emperor Napoleon III awarded him a gold ring in recognition for his work. Totten died on May 17, 1884, in New York City.

References

Sources cited McCullough, David. Brave Companions: Portraits in History, Chapter 6, "Steam Road to El Dorado", New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992, ISBN 978-0-671-79276-3

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with George M. Totten

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what George M. Totten claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to George M. Totten before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about George M. Totten ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of George M. Totten

In research: George M. Totten appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses George M. Totten in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: George M. Totten is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1808 births, 1884 deaths, 19th-century American engineers, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for George M. Totten outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study George M. Totten in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what George M. Totten means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain George M. Totten out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is George M. Totten in simple terms?

Why does George M. Totten matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study George M. Totten?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on George M. Totten.