Greaves-Walker Ceramic Engineering Papers 1925-1952, undated

Greaves-Walker Engineers was the consulting firm of A. F. (Arthur Frederick) Greaves-Walker (1881-1954), who in 1924 founded the ceramic engineering program at North Carolina State College (later North Carolina State University). For a time in the 1920s, the firm was known as Greaves-Walker and Shands, when it offered mechanical engineering as well as ceramic engineering design services. It had become Greaves-Walker Engineers by the late 1930s.

A. F. Greaves-Walker was born in London, England, in 1881. He received a degree in higher education from Ohio State University, and then he worked in industry for 20 years. He was vice president of Stevens, Inc., of Atlanta, GA, in 1923 when he left to begin NC State University's ceramic engineering program, which was the first program of its kind in the American South. He headed the department until his retirement in 1946. During World War II, he worked for the United States War Production Board, and from 1946 to 1953 he directed ceramics research at the University of Florida. He died in 1954 in Mt. Clemens, Michigan.

During his career, Greaves-Walker served as head of the American Ceramic Society, the Institute of Ceramic Engineers, Keramos, and the Canadian Ceramic Society. His publications in the field included Clay Plant construction and Operation (1919), Drying Ceramic Products (4 editions, 19??-1948), and several books on production of brick and clay product in North Carolina and Florida, as well as minerals in those states.

The Greaves-Walker Ceramic Engineering Papers, 1925-1952, contains correspondence, financial records, reports, notes, calculation sheets, drawings, and other papers documenting A. F. Greaves-Walker's consulting work with industrial businesses, mostly in the United States but some in Canada. Topics include clay and mineral analyses, brick production, and design of facilities and equipment (including kilns). Some files were originally in the North Carolina State University Department of Materials Science and Engineering Records (UA 105.014) and were transferred to this collection.

Materials are organized into two series: Consulting Files and Drawings.

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[Identification of item], Greaves-Walker Ceramic Engineering Papers, MC 00675, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC

Transferred from North Carolina State University, Office of the University Architect, 2019 (Accession 2019.0265), as well as the North Carolina State University Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Processed by: Todd Kosmerick, 2019 October; machine-readable finding aid by: Todd Kosmerick, 2019 October.