Springs, Formulas and Flatland:A Path to Boundary Integral Methods in Elasticity

This memoir is about some embryonic thoughts and experiences with what is now often called the Direct Boundary Integral Method for boundary value problems in ‘classical elastostatics.’ It covers a very early period for me, from about 1954 to 1965, when I wrestled with relevant theoretical and mathematical issues, which I thought were important, primarily in the last two or three of those years. This was before I became aware of other contributors to the method, who are not mentioned here, and before they became aware of my work. So this is not a memoir largely filled with recollections of people and places; although I believe that subsequent interactions with fellow contributors and users of computational methods have become the most important part of my research experience. In any case, I understand that memoirs and papers of a more technical nature, written by some of those contributors, are part of these EJBE volumes. Those writings have bearing, no doubt, on the present memoir and much more, over a long period of time, and I look forward to reading them all...