Contents
2 ISBN 0-312-4347 4
34‘‘My task was not to preach about God, but to serve God in silence about God.’’
5 In 1927 Bucky Fuller was a total failure, a college dropout, penniless, unable to support his wife and newborn daughter, a man on the verge of suicide. Standing on the edge of Lake Michigan, he underwent a profound religious experience that was to shape the course of his activity for the next fifty years. Committing ‘‘ego-cide,’’ he turned away from efforts aimed only at his own personal advantage and dedicated his life to doing what needed to be done for the advantage of all humanity. By not preaching to mankind but by inventing solutions to mankind’s problems—solutions that could be implemented in concrete artifacts that would change the way people lived rather than their opinions—Fuller entered on a half-century experiment (which he nicknamed ‘‘Guinea Pig B’’). He chose to see what ‘‘the little man,’’ the single individual, could do alone—without the backing of big business, governments, or religious establishments—to help solve the problems that confront humanity today.
6 This book of Fuller’s 28 patented inventions stands as a resounding affirmation of what an individual, relying on his own initiative and integrity, can accomplish against overwhelming odds, even in today’s mass society. Over fifty years after beginning this experiment, in the year preceding his death, Fuller looked back in order to render an account to God and to his fellowmen for the course of his lifetime. At the age of eighty-seven he produced perhaps the most original and profound apologia pro vita mia to be seen in this century, a book that invites both intellectual and moral reflection.
9 INVENTIONS
10 Books by R. Buckminster Fuller available from St. Martin’s Press
11Critical Path
12Tetrascroll: A Cosmic Fairy Tale Grunch of Giants
13 INVENTIONS
14 THE PATENTED WORKS OF
15 R. BUCKMINSTER FULLER
16 ST. MARTIN’S PRESS NEW YORK
17 CONTENTS
18Introduction: Guinea Pig B vii
Patents | 15 | 19Tensegrity | 20179 | ||
211 | 22Stockade: Building Structure | 231 | 2416 | 25Submarisle (Undersea Island) | 26194 |
272 | 28Stockade: Pneumatic Forming Process | 296 | 3017 | 31Aspension (Suspension Building) | 32201 |
333 | 344D House | 3511 | 3618 | 37Monohex (Geodesic Structures) | 38214 |
394 | 40Dymaxion Car | 4130 | 4219 | 43Laminar Dome | 44227 |
455 | 46Dymaxion Bathroom | 4741 | 4820 | 49Octa Spinner | 50241 |
516 | 52Dymaxion Deployment Unit (sheet) | 5353 | 5421 | 55Star Tensegrity (Octahedral Truss) | 56248 |
5722 | 58Rowing Needles (Watercraft) | 59257 | |||
607 | 61Dymaxion Deployment Unit (frame) | 6274 | 6323 | 64Geodesic Hexa-Pent | 65264 |
668 | 67Dymaxion Map | 6885 | 6924 | 70Floatable Breakwater | 71269 |
729 | 73Dymaxion House (Wichita) | 7495 | 7525 | 76Non-symmetrical Tensegrity | 77274 |
7810 | 79Geodesic Dome | 80127 | 8126 | 82Floating Breakwater | 83281 |
8411 | 85Paperboard Dome | 86145 | 8727 | 88Tensegrity Truss | 89286 |
9012 | 91Plydome | 92157 | 9328 | 94Hanging Storage Shelf Unit | 95294 |
9613 | 97Catenary (Geodesic Tent) | 98162 | |||
9914 | 100Octet Truss | 101167 | Appendix:
Honorary
Doctorate
Citations | 102299 | |
