A Fond Remembrance of Edward B. Wilkens, Rutgers' First Planning Professor

Abstract

I enrolled in Rutgers College in September 1950, hoping to graduate in June 1954 with a degree in electrical engineering. All engineering students took the same curriculum during their freshman year, and only in their sophmore year did they begin to specialize. As part of our first year's, program, we were required to attend lectures given by representatives of each of the engineering departments—electrical, chemical, civil, etc. The idea was good—many of the freshman had no idea as to what engineering speciality they were interested in. I remember talking to one freshman who picked electrical engineering because he thought he would be able to fix his television set when he graduated.1 One of the orientation lectures was given by a tall, crew-cut professor by the name of Edward B. Wilkens—-"Doc" Wilkens to faculty and students. His pitch was for city planning engineering. Rutgers was, at the time, one of only three colleges offering undergraduate degrees in city planning engineering.2 In fact, in 1950-1951, only 19 colleges were offering graduate degrees in planning.3 Wilkens' lecture was full of slides, a device he used with great effectiveness in all his courses. He talked about city planning as the field for the Renaissance Man, a term which probably meant nothing to most of the fledgeling engineers listening to Doc's somewhat high-pitched voice and frequent laugh as he told funny stories about planners and politicians. His point was effective, at least to this listener: Planning was a field which encompassed engineering, architecture and design but also relied on law, economics and political science. The planner might be called upon to design a housing layout, come up