Latest revision as of 13:34, 13 August 2020

Abstract

Fifty years elapsed since the appearance of the title paper, in Bull. Am. Math. Soc., 49, 1-23 (1943), and twenty six since my original encounter with it. I first read it in 1967 during an internal workshop on the origins of the finite element method (FEM), held at UC Berkeley, where I was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate. I must admit at not having been overly impressed - the pride of having just finished a thesis in refined elements coupled with the arrogance of youth to dismiss what to me seemed like tricial hand calculations for a simple torsion problem. Why, a 1967 CDC 6600 computer wrap those up in milliseconds...