January 5, 2015
Environmental journalist Waldman offers a lively collection of musings on the history of humans’ age-old battle with corrosion, telling a story as much about professional specialization as about materials science. He focuses less on the technicalities of combatting this ubiquitous Industrial Age enemy than on the individuals who find their joys and livelihoods in something many of us consider below our notice. Waldman inserts himself into the worlds of those who are passionate about rust: on an adventure with an ever-trespassing photographer in the abandoned Bethlehem Steel Works, on the set of a Pentagon training video featuring actor LeVar Burton and sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense’s “corrosion czar,” talking to the introverted and underappreciated men who attend the annual gathering of the National Association of Corrosion Engineers (and the salespeople who make their living selling anticorrosion paints), and locking horns with a journalist-fearing members of the metal-packaging Ball Company while sneaking into their corporate Can School (devoted to canning). It’s a detailed, fun read with a valuable reminder that every seemingly irrelevant item we take for granted each day is front and center for someone else.
December 15, 2014
How the world turns to rust.Oxidation occurs on everything made of metal, corroding cars, boats, trains and planes and causing bridges to fall and washing machines to explode. Rust, journalist Waldman writes in his sprightly debut book, "represents the disordering of the modern" and has an impact on "our health, safety, security, environment, and future." It's a human enemy, battled throughout history by a cast of inventive, often quirky men and, occasionally, women. Take Harry Brearley, born in 1871, a self-taught British chemist with no patience for scientists' "bluff and bunkum." He was "curious but opinionated, flexible but intolerant, innovative but persnickety, knowledgeable but overconfident, and determined but obstinate." His determination led to his invention of a process to make steel that would not corrode; someone else marketed it as stainless steel, and it revolutionized the production of cutlery, machinery and weapons. Rust can also be beautiful, Waldman learns from Alyssha Eve Csuk, "the country's preeminent rust photographer," who spent years documenting Bethlehem Steel Works and its demolition. Her images of rust evoke comparisons to "a forest, leaves in snow, a nebula, an amoeba." John Carmona, "rust's Johnny Appleseed," started selling rust removal and prevention products from his garage in Fitchburg, Wisconsin, and a few years later expanded into a 10,000-foot warehouse, carrying 250 rust products. Surprisingly, the author discovered, colleges offer few courses on corrosion for materials science and engineering majors. Nevertheless, some 15,000 corrosion engineers are at work in the United States, in oil and gas industries, transportation and utilities. One small New Jersey company developed a polymer stronger than steel for use in bridges and buildings, and some corrosion engineers work on developing biomedical implants. Waldman is a bright and curious companion in this lively adventure in search of the scourge of rust and its ingenious opponents.
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February 15, 2015
One of the first arresting tidbits of information to greet the reader in this book of nonstop eye-opening surprises is the fact that oxidationbetter known as rustcauses more than $400 billion worth of damage per year in the U.S. alone, a figure that dwarfs the costs of all other natural disasters combined. Environmental journalist Waldman pulls no punches in showing how destructive and even life-threatening rust can be, bringing down bridges, triggering house fires, and causing hundreds of manhole explosions. The opening chapter on the Statue of Liberty recounts how the famous American icon nearly collapsed from corrosion in the iron frame before a complex, multimillion-dollar restoration saved it for future generations. Another chapter profiles the colorful life of British metallurgist Harry Brearley, who effectively made his fortune on rust by discovering and marketing stainless steel. Still another describes the intricate science and politics behind rust-free aluminum-can manufacturing. A brilliantly written and fascinating close-up look at one of nature's most neglected threats to man-made structures and machines.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)