Prof

W. Jack Cunningham, Professor Emeritus in EE, will speak

at a benefit for Eli Whitney Museum (Nov. 29, 915 Whitney Ave.)

about the railroads established by Joseph E. Sheffield, a major

benefactor of Engineering at Yale. Mr. Sheffield's gifts to Yale included

several buildings one of which, given in 1858, was located at the

corner of Prospect and Grove streets, present site of SSS,

Sheffield-Sterling-Strathcona Hall. Mr. Sheffield's continued support

resulted in Yale naming its growing commitment to engineering

education the Sheffield Scientific School ("Sheff"), in 1861.

Mr. Sheffield, who had made his money in cotton, was very

interested in improving the transportation of goods. He participated

in the financing of a canal running from New Haven to Northampton, MA,

and then of the railroad which replaced the canal. He also participated

in the financing of the railroad between New Haven and New York City,

in completing the Michigan Southern Railroad over which the first

train from the East entered Chicago in 1852, and in building the

Chicago and Rock Island Railroad, including the first railroad bridge

across the Mississippi River, in 1855.

All of us have crossed Mr. Sheffield's canal and railroad tracks,

when we walked across the bridge on our way to the Health Center.

The Sheffield name returned to prominence in Yale Engineering during

the 1990's with the establishment of the Sheffield Fellowship and

the Sheffield Teaching Awards, and Mr. Sheffield's canal/railroad

line is coming back as The Farmington Canal Heritage Trail which

will allow people to bike from New Haven to the border of Massachusetts.

Prof. Cunningham's talk will be enhanced by an exhibit of the Palmer

Engine (www.eng.yale.edu/history/rr/montage/default.htm), the

extraordinary live-steam, scale brass engine that is permanently

housed in our Becton Faculty Lounge. For more on Joseph E. Sheffield,