American engineer Charles Day is renowned as the co-founder of Day & Zimmermann. He was a prominent expert in business management and made significant contributions to the development of flowcharts and route diagrams. Read more at philadelphia.name.
Day’s education was in electrical engineering, but his career spanned mechanical engineering, construction, and management. Taylor Birchard once called him “a symbol of American industrial genius.” Let’s delve deeper into the life and career of this distinguished engineer.
Early Life and Career Beginnings
Charles was born in Germantown, Philadelphia, on May 15, 1879. He attended a local academy where he met Kern Dodge, who would later become his business partner. After high school, Day chose the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1899 with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. Two years later, he earned a master’s degree in engineering.
After completing his bachelor’s, Day participated in the export exhibition in Philadelphia as an inspector for the installation of power plant equipment and transmission mechanisms. Following this, he was invited to work at Link Belt Engineering Co., oheaded by his friend Kern’s father. Charles started as an assistant supervisor and later became a production engineer. He was actively involved in modernizing the company, demonstrating both initiative and ingenuity.
The company president was a proponent of scientific management. Day became deeply interested in these ideas and subsequently continued their development and practical implementation. By the time his article on the subject appeared in The American Magazine in 1911, he was already considered one of the leading advocates of scientific management theory.
Day & Zimmermann: Foundation and Key Projects
In 1901, Kern Dodge earned his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Drexel Institute. In the same year, the friends co-founded Dodge & Day, specializing in design, commercial equipment, and management.
Kern and Charles dreamed of more than just a successful business or financial gain. Their ambition was to create a revolutionary enterprise and modernize engineering. In their earliest days, they had only a humble shed, a handful of ideas, and abundant hope, with no clients yet. However, that quickly changed. Engineer Conrad Lauer joined them, and the organization soon expanded its capabilities, adding engineering and construction work in industrial and public utility sectors.
In 1907, Charles’s other classmate, John Zimmermann, proposed becoming a partner in the firm. The company then adopted a new name: Dodge, Day & Zimmermann. Four years later, Kern Dodge decided to leave the business, and the firm became simply Day & Zimmermann. It was formally incorporated under this name in 1916 and continues to operate successfully today, known by that very name.
Key projects in the company’s early days included:
- Designing the Gatun Lock for the Panama Canal in 1907. The Philadelphia-based firm, then Day, Dodge & Zimmermann, laid the first concrete slabs on this monumental project.
- In 1911, Charles Day participated in a study of Navy shipyard management, where he proposed applying his scientific management ideas. However, during Interstate Commerce Commission hearings, the Secretary of the Navy opposed scientific management in this area.
- In 1914, the firm began collaborating with the Hershey chocolate company, for whom they manufactured machines for wrapping sweets in foil.
Step by step, the number of partners grew, as did the company’s reputation. Simultaneously, Charles Day developed his own engineering ideas and penned scientific publications. Among his most notable achievements were flowcharts and route diagrams. Furthermore, he created a lecture course for Harvard Business School, and the University of Pennsylvania invited him to join its board of trustees.
During World War I, the acclaimed engineer served on the United States Shipping Board and collaborated with the Emergency Fleet Corporation.
The End of a Remarkable Engineer’s Life
Charles Day was active in the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, served on the board of managers for the Franklin Institute, and headed its mechanical engineering section. He was an associate member of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, the New York Electrical Society, the Engineers’ Club of Philadelphia and New York, and also held membership in the American Philosophical Society.
Until his last days, he led the management of Day & Zimmermann, Inc. The distinguished engineer passed away on May 10, 1931, in Philadelphia. He was only 53 years old, but a sudden illness cut short his life and his ambitious plans.
Charles Day succeeded in founding an engineering firm that skillfully designed manufacturing plants and construction projects over a century ago and remains competitive in the 21st-century market. He didn’t just generate ideas; he brought them to life, developing important innovative graphic techniques and making significant contributions to the theory and practice of scientific management.