Description
The first edition of Ships Machinery And Mossbacks: The Autobiography Of A Naval Engineer, inscribed by Vice Admiral Harold G. Bowen, USN, to Rear Admiral Wilson Durward Leggett, Jr.
Octavo, vii, [3], 397pp. Gray cloth, title stamped in blue and red on the spine. The first printing, with no additional printings noted. Clean text throughout. Light soiling to cloth spine, offsetting to endpapers. Lacking dust jacket, if issued. Inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper: “To Durward Leggett, in appreciation of his unusual helpfulness to the author when he was Engineer-In-Chief of the Navy. Hal Bowen.”
Vice Admiral Harold G. Bowen Sr. (1883 – 1965) served in the United States Navy from 1905 to 1947, graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy and earning a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Columbia University. He served as Chief of the Bureau of Engineering, Director of the Naval Research Laboratory, and the first head of the Office of Research and Invention (which became the Office of Naval Research), contributing to wartime developments such as radar and advanced propulsion; he was awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal and later had USS Bowen named in his honor.
