History of Applied Mechanics Cabinet and Mechanisms Collection

The scientific and technical revolution which began in the 18th century, led to society becoming aware of the need for training engineers. The first such school was École Polytechnique, founded in 1794 in Paris by G. Monge. In the 19th century, high technical institution and engineering universities began to appear. In Russia the first such institution was the Institute of Corps Engineers of Communications (today – Petersburg University of Transport) opened in 1810 in St. Petersburg. A. Betancourt took great part in its establishment.

means of engineering education. All major universities and technical institutes had significant collections of such models. Collecting, designing and manufacturing of the models of machines and mechanisms were practiced by A. Betancourt (Royal Cabinet in Spain in the period 1791–1808), J.F. Redtenbacher (Polytechnic Institute in Karlsruhe in the period 1840–1863), J. Schröder (Polytechnic Institute in Darmstadt), F. Reuleaux (Berlin Higher Technical College during the period 1879–1905), F. Orlov (Moscow University and the Imperial Moscow Technical Secondary School during the period 1872–1892), I. Rachmaninoff (Kiev University during the period 1853–1883), V. Ishmenitsky (Kharkov University during the period 1872–1882) and many other scientists. The largest collection of kinematic models (more than 800) was collected by F. Reuleaux. This collection was considered to be ideal for technical schools in Germany and other countries [40–42]. Unfortunately, most of the collection was lost in 1945, during the bombing raids.