MIT ─ A Historical and Architectural Guide

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the nation's most beautiful and technologically advanced campuses, is the focus of this colorful cultural and architectural history. Sited along the Charles River in Cambridge, MIT has a history that spans more than a century, from its original location in Copley Square to its current home. In this two-part volume Douglass Shand-Tucci recalls the intellectual trajectory of the institution and the innovators who developed the campus, starting in 1861, including Alexander Graham Bell, William Welles Bosworth, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., and William Barton Rogers.

Tracing the legacy, Shand-Tucci provides a captivating tale of the campus that led not only to technological inspiration but also to the best collection of architectural tourism on a university campus, with masterpieces by architects including Jonathan and William Preston, Eero Saarinen, Kevin Roche, I. M. Pei, Steven Holl, and Frank Gehry. Sculptures by significant artists, such as Alexander Calder, Henry Moore, Louise Nevelson, and Michael Heizer, adorn the campus and are described in five walking tours.

Historian and author Douglass Shand-Tucci, the Harvard-educated independent scholar, is founder of Back Bay Historical, dedicated to Boston-Centric Global Studies &pipe; Art and Architecture; Literary, Cultural and Intellectual History. He is the author of many books, including Boston Bohemia, Built in Boston, The Art of Scandal, the Harvard University Campus Guide, and The Crimson Letter.

Douglass Shand-Tucci lives in Boston's Back Bay, where the learned flow is sometimes interrupted by provocative reviews and comment. He has taught at Harvard, where he was Senior Affiliate in the History of Architecture in Eliot House, and at MIT and is now on the faculty of the Boston Architectural College.