ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING. Elec trical engineering is probably the youngest of all the professions, for it has hardly been recog nized as a regular profession for more than 15 years past. As a result, the men who have reached prominence in it to-day have attained their positions from widely different courses of preliminary training; many of them are men who started life in other lines of work and afterward turned to electrical pursuits on ac count of the sudden growth and importance of the business. In consequence of this, all meth ods of preliminary education are represented and their relative values can be estimated. The argument runs largely between two classes of men— one represented by the so-called °prac tical man° and the other by the theoretical electrician; the graduate of the mac.hine shop and the graduate of the university. Both of these types have attained success, but the cor rect answer to the argument will probably be found in a proper combination of the two types. In the past some of the most successful elec trical engineers have belonged distinctly to the class of practical men with little theoretical training, but the conditions have changed. In the early days of the profession, there was little theory or predetermination of results and work was carried on largely by guesswork or by cut and dry approximations. At the present time, however, such a state of development has been reacited that exactness of result is essential to success and work based upon exact theory be comes imperative. In a stationary condition of an art a man with practical experience only may become very familiar with all the existing types of apparatus and, Icnowing their various applications, may qualify, to an extent, as an engineer. But the extraordinarily rapid growth of the electrical arts places electrical engineer ing apart from all the other engineering branches, for new discoveries and theories malce radical changes from year to year in the construction and operation of electrical ma chinery. The engineer whose education is based only upon practical experience cannot keep up with the progress and change resulting from it, and falls behind; whereas, the man with lcnowl edge of the theory, and a mind trained by the theoretical studies and scientific reasoning, easily grasps the theory of the change and re adjusts his mind to the new without difficulty or delay. Many instances can be cited of men who have been prominent as electrical engineers, who have been dropped out of place in the course of the rapid progress which has been made, on account of a lacic of theoretical foundation in their Icnowledge. Those who have retained their positions throughout the growth of the art have done so by persistent study along theoretical lines.
In its present state electrical engineering is the most scientific of all engineering profes sions. A man must be to a great extent a physicist, a chemist and a mathematician, as well as be familiar with mac.hinery and its de sign, in order to be a worker in the broadest field. Many of the problems connected with other branches of engineering can be solved by common sense and by one's sense of proportion as guided by experience and by the eye. But most of the problems in electricity are invisible, so to spealc, and can be understood only through their expression in the form of symbols. Probably no one *ill dispute to-day that the preliminary education of an electrical engineer demands a special training in those theoretical branches, mathetnatics, physics, chemistry and mechanics, sufficient to train his mind into ac curate methods of thought and reasoning and to supply him with the actual technical informa tion which he will need in the practice of his profession. But theory alone is not all. The human mind is such that it works with difficulty in pure theory without a series of mental pictures to fix and co-ordinate the ideas, and the study of theory is likely to make little last ing impression unless the physical meaning of the theory is brought out by constant associa tion with actual apparatus which demonstrates the application of the physical law. The best course of training for an electrical engineer would seem to be a broad course of education in general subjects at the preparatory school before entering college, with practical work, if possible, along lines of simple mechanics, such as carpentry, in order to train the mind into a sense of proportion and the relations of parts, which is the basis of all engineering. Next, a college course with general subjects the first year, and afterward, for the remaining years of the course, those general and theoretical sub jects which have a direct bearing upon the prac tice of the electrical profession, such as mathe matics, mechanics, physics, chemistry, theoreti cal electricity, and magnetism and thermo dynamics. This should be supplemented by actual daily practical work with machinery operating by the principles covered by the theory studied and demonstrating all the phe nomena incident to the theory. After gradua tion an apprentice course should be pursued in some large electrical manufacturing establish ment where the commercial relations of the knowledge acquired in college can be clearly set forth. Large machines can be operated which are not available at a college and experience in the installation of large plants can be obtained, and experience gained in the designing depart ments where all kinds of commercial apparatus are laid out.