Main content
W.L. Badger Associates Collection
Notifications
Held at: Science History Institute Archives [Contact Us]315 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Science History Institute Archives. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated was an American chemical engineering consulting firm noted for its expertise with evaporators and water desalination. It was founded by Walter L. Badger (1886-1958), a prominent American chemical engineer and a noted expert on evaporators. The firm's origins date back to 1917 when Badger, then a chemical engineering professor at the University of Michigan, was offered a consultant position by Swenson Evaporator Company and asked to design a research laboratory for them. Believing that such a project was best carried out by a university, Badger negotiated a joint venture between Swenson and the University of Michigan, in which Swenson built a new chemical engineering laboratory at the University of Michigan campus and was in return permitted to use it for its own purposes.
From 1917 to 1937, Badger ran the new laboratory for the two cooperating parties, serving as both Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Michigan (where he supervised graduate student and future CHF patron Donald L. Othmer) and as Consulting Engineer at Swenson. In this dual capacity, Badger worked with a number of Swenson's clients, assisting them with the planning, operation, and troubleshooting of their evaporators. The partnership between Swenson and the University of Michigan proved very successful. As a result, Badger's chemical engineering consultant practice grew considerably.
In 1937, Badger resigned his professorship at the University of Michigan and was named Manager of Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division. At Dow, he played a key role in the company's development of vaporizers and heating equipment using Dowtherm heat transfer fluid. He was also responsible for the revision of the caustic finishing plant at Dow's Great Western Electrochemical Plant in Pittsburg, California and performed consultant work for a number of Dow's clients. In addition to working full-time at Dow, Badger continued to do private consulting work on the side, maintaining a close relationship with Swenson Evaporator Company and the University of Michigan.
Dow disbanded its Consulting Engineering Division in 1944, which prompted Badger to go into business for himself. That same year, he established W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer, an independent chemical engineering consultant practice based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Largely picking up from where Dow left off, the new practice soon became noted for its expertise with evaporators. The firm grew and acquired a large and international clientele. Between the mid 1940s and mid 1950s, it focused mainly on evaporators designed to recover solids from solutions, which included those at salt plants operated by International Salt Company in the United States, and a salt, caustic soda, and chlorine plant operated by Murgatroyd's Salt and Chemical Company in England. During the mid 1950s, W.L. Badger also started working on evaporators designed to recover water, which most notably involved early research and development work on water desalination plants for the U.S Department of the Interior's Office of Saline Water. In order to expand and keep up with its growing clientele, the firm was incorporated in the State of Michigan and renamed W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated in 1957, with Walter L. Badger serving as president.
Walter L. Badger passed away suddenly on November 19, 1958. He was succeeded as president by Ferris C. Standiford, Badger's very first employee and a prominent chemical engineer in his own right. Under Standiford's leadership, W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated continued to flourish. Between 1958 and 1977, the firm was renowned for its work on evaporators for water desalination plants in the United States and abroad. Of particular note was the firm's engineering and development work on two water desalination plants built and operated by the U.S. Department of the Interior's Office of Saline Water: the Freeport, Texas Demonstration Plant and the Harbor Island, North Carolina Pilot Plant. During this time period, W.L. Badger was also a co-owner of Seawater Conversion Corporation, a joint venture with Kaighin and Hughes, Incorporated established to design, build, and operate water desalination facilities using Long-Tube-Vertical Multiple-Effect evaporator systems. The firm also continued to work on evaporators for the recovery of solids from solutions, which included those for salt plants operated by Morton Salt Company in the United States and Refinaria Sal ITA S.A. in Brazil.
W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated relocated to Greenbank, Washington in 1977. From about that point on, the firm became less active and gradually wound down its activities over a period of many years. However the firm continued to do notable work. Under its auspices during the late 1970s and early 1980s, Ferris C. Standiford worked on the development of falling film multistage flash evaporators. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the firm was a co-owner of Spintech Industries, Incorporated, a Bellevue, Washington based firm that manufactured the Spinflash 5000, a small water desalination machine.
W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated held its last board of directors meeting on March 1, 2002. Ferris C. Standiford passed away on June 10, 2003.
Sources
W.L. Badger Associates Collection, Chemical Heritage Foundation Archives, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
The W.L. Badger Associates Collection contains the corporate records of W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated. The collection is arranged into the following sixteen series:
- Memoranda Files
- Subject Files
- Legal Files
- Financial Files
- Notebooks
- Proposals
- Reports
- Patent Files
- Ferris C. Standiford Files
- Articles, Papers, and Brochures Files
- Printed Materials
- Miscellaneous
- Drawings
- Electronic Storage Materials
- Oversized
- Photographic Materials
The W.L. Badger Associates Collection was donated to the Science History Institute (formerly the Chemical Heritage Foundation) by David Standiford in September 2015.
The W.L. Badger Associates Collection was processed by Kenton G. Jaehnig in December 2017.
People
Organization
- Dow Chemical Company. Consulting Engineering Division
- Seawater Conversion Corporation
- Spintech Industries, Inc.
- Swenson Evaporator Company
- United States. Office of Saline Water
Subject
- Chemical engineering -- History
- Chemical engineering consultants
- Chemical engineers
- Desalination and water purification
- Engineering firms
- Evaporation
- Saline water conversion
- Saline water conversion plants
- Saline water conversion plant -- Pilot plants
- Salt industry and trade
- Seawater -- Distillation
Place
- Publisher
- Science History Institute Archives
- Finding Aid Author
- Finding aid created and encoded into EAD by Kenton G. Jaehnig.
- Finding Aid Date
- December 2017
- Access Restrictions
-
There are no access restrictions on the materials for research purposes and the collection is open to the public.
- Use Restrictions
-
The Science History Institute holds copyright to the W.L. Badger Associates Collection. The researcher assumes full responsibility for all copyright, property, and libel laws as they apply.
Collection Inventory
Arranged alphabetically by subject and numerically by memorandum number, this series consists of W.L. Badger Associates' memoranda files. A large majority of the materials in these files were created by W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated and the following corporate predecessors: W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer and Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division. A small amount of materials created by Walter L. Badger himself are also found here.
The memoranda files mainly document the consultant work W.L. Badger Associates and its predecessors performed for its clients. The materials also document the evolution of the firm from a Dow Chemical Company division to a well established independent concern. To a much lesser extent, the professional activities of Walter L. Badger and Ferris C. Standiford are documented here as well.
Numbered memoranda make up a large majority of the materials preserved in this series. A small amount of accompanying materials, including indexes, notes, and a few photographs, are found here as well.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 3 black and white images.
This series contains W.L. Badger Associates' subject files. The contents of the Subject Files are arranged into the following five sub-series:
- E Numbered Files
- G Numbered Files – Dowtherm
- H Numbered Files
- S Numbered Files – Seawater Conversion Corporation
- Alphabetical Files
Arranged numerically by file number, this sub-series consists of a large, but incomplete, portion of W.L. Badger Associates' "E" numbered subject files. The files in this sub-series were created by W.L. Badger Associates and the following corporate predecessors: W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer and Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division.
The E Numbered Files primarily concern the firm's business activities. They mainly document the consultant work the firm performed for its clients and provide an extensive amount of technical information about many of the projects it worked on between the 1930s and 1980s. A handful of files regarding a proposed book by Walter L. Badger and Gordon E. Seavoy are also present in this sub-series. A few files pertaining to articles, book chapters, and papers written by Walter L. Badger and Ferris C. Standiford are also found here.
The contents of the E Numbered Files consist mainly of correspondence, blueprints, and reports. A significant amount of photocopied articles, article reprints, notes, graphs, tables, and drawing reproductions are also found in these files. Article and book chapter manuscripts, indexes, drawings, legal documents, miscellaneous printed materials, photographs, photo negatives, and photo reproductions are preserved in this sub-series as well.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 7 black and white images.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 6 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 4 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 6 black and white images.
Contains 75 black and white images.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 4 black and white images.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 5 black and white images.
Contains 5 black and white images.
Contains 3 black and white images and 3 black and white photo reproductions.
Contains 9 black and white images.
Contains 11 black and white images, 7 color images, and 5 black and white negatives.
Arranged numerically by file number and alphabetically by subject, this sub-series consists of W.L. Badger Associates' "G" numbered subject files. A large majority of the files in this sub-series were created by W.L. Badger Associates' corporate predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer. A small number of files created by Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division and W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated are also found here.
The G Numbered Files concern the firm's business activities regarding Dowtherm evaporators. They mainly the document the firm's business dealings with clients who used Dowtherm evaporators. They also provide detailed technical information about the various Dowtherm evaporator projects it worked on.
The contents of the G Numbered Files consist primarily of correspondence. Noticeable amounts of blueprints and reports are also found in these files. Indexes, article reprints, drawing reproductions, charts, graphs, papers, memoranda, and miscellaneous printed materials are preserved here as well.
Arranged numerically by file number, this sub-series consists of a large, but incomplete, portion of W.L. Badger Associates' "H" numbered subject files. A large majority of the files in this sub-series were created by W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated. A small number of files created by W.L. Badger Associates' corporate predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer are also found here.
The H Numbered files primarily concern the firm's business activities. They mainly document the consultant work the firm performed for its clients and provide an extensive amount of technical information about many of the projects it worked on between the 1950s and 1970s. A significant number of files in this sub-series document inquiries made by potential clients regarding the firm's consultant services. A smaller, but noticeable, number of files regarding patents applied for and awarded to members of the firm's staff (most notably Ferris C. Standiford) are also present in this sub-series. A few files regarding subjects of interests of to the firm's staff and a single file regarding an article written by Ferris C. Standiford are preserved here as well.
The contents of the H-Numbered Files consist primarily of correspondence, blueprints, reports, and notes. A significant amount of legal documents and drawing reproductions are also in these files. Indexes, photocopied articles, patents, maps, miscellaneous printed materials, photographs, photo negative strips, and slides are preserved in this sub-series as well.
Contains 23 black and white images.
Contains 12 black and white images.
File empty.
(See H-458.2)
Contains 2 black and white images.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
Contains 2 black and white images.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
File empty.
See E-241 for complete file.
File empty.
See E-236.
File empty.
All materials transferred to E-237.
File empty.
See E-242 for complete file.
Contains 3 color images, 8 color slides, and 4 black and white negative strips.
Arranged numerically by file number, this sub-series consists of a very small and incomplete portion of W.L. Badger Associates' "S" numbered subject files. It concerns the business activities of Seawater Conversion Corporation, W.L. Badger Associates' joint venture with Kaighin and Hughes, Incorporated. The files mainly document Seawater Conversion Corporation's dealings with the Los Angeles Water Commission, who retained the firm to design a seawater conversion plant.
The contents of the S Numbered Files consist mainly of correspondence. Indexes, miscellaneous printed materials, memoranda, notes, a questionnaire, and photocopied articles are found in this sub-series as well.
Arranged alphabetically by subject, this sub-series consists of W.L. Badger Associates' alphabetical subject files. A majority of the files were created by W.L. Badger Associates and the following corporate predecessors: W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer and Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division. A significant number of files created by W.L. Badger Associates' joint ventures, Seawater Conversion Corporation and Spintech Industries, Incorporated, are also found in this sub-series. A small number of files created by Swenson Evaporator Company, who retained Walter L. Badger as a consultant for many years, are also preserved here.
The Alphabetical Files document a variety of different types of topics. About a quarter of the files pertain to the firm's business activities, documenting the consultant work the firm performed for its clients and providing a large amount of technical information on a number of the projects it worked on. Another quarter of the files concern subjects that were of general interest to the firm and its staff. A somewhat smaller portion of files in this sub-series regard the activities of the firm's joint ventures Seawater Conversion Corporation and Spintech Industries, Incorporated, which document their business activities and provide technical information about the various projects they were involved with. A small, but noticeable, number of files concern the firm's internal projects, most notably Ferris C. Standiford's research and development work on falling film multistage flash evaporators. A handful of files pertaining to the professional activities of the firm's staff, including, but not limited to, participation in conferences and symposiums and writing articles are also preserved here.
The contents of the Alphabetical Files consist mainly of correspondence, reports, blueprints, and notes. A significant amount of graphs, tables, magazine articles, photocopied articles, and article reprints are also found in these files. Government documents, legal documents, miscellaneous printed materials, and a few photographs are preserved in these files as well.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 5 color images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Contains 3 color images and 1 black and white image.
Contains 24 color images.
Contains 9 color images.
Contains 5 color images.
Contains 2 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
Arranged alphabetically by subject, this series contains W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated's legal files. A majority of the files in this series document the legal affairs of the firm itself. Nine files concerning a pair of court cases in which Ferris C. Standiford was an expert witness, Grain Power-Tucamari, Limited vs. York International and Great Northern Paper Company vs. Unitech, are also present in this series. Four files concerning the legal affairs of W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated's joint ventures, Seawater Conversion Corporation and Spintech Industries, Incorporated, are also found in this series. A single file concerning the copyright to problem solutions coauthored by Walter L. Badger in the textbook Introduction to Chemical Engineering is preserved here as well.
The contents of the Legal Files consist mainly of legal documents, correspondence, minutes, and notes. Tables, graphs, drawing reproductions, photocopied articles, and stock certificates are preserved in these files as well.
See also H-741.
See E-242.
See H-496.
See also E-250.
See E-226.
See E-119.
See H-407.
Arranged alphabetically by subject, this series contains W.L. Badger Associates' financial files. They provide a limited amount of documentation regarding the financial affairs of W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated and its corporate predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer.
A majority of the files in this series concern the financial affairs of the firm itself. Two files concerning the firm's financial dealings with Resources Conservation Company, an engineering company that assisted with the design and construction of multistage flash evaporators and the Spinflash 5000 desalination machine, are also present in this series. Two files documenting the financial affairs of W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated's joint ventures, Seawater Conversion Corporation and Spintech Industries, Incorporated, are preserved here as well.
The contents of the Financial Files consist mainly of ledger pages, correspondence, invoices, and purchase orders. Legal documents, notes, and expense reports are found here as well.
Arranged alphabetically by subject, this series contains W.L. Badger Associates' notebooks. A large majority of the notebooks were created by W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated and its corporate predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer. This series also contains four notebooks created by Swenson Evaporator Company, for whom Walter L. Badger served as a consultant for many years. Also present in this series are two pocket notebooks created by Ferris C. Standiford. A single notebook created by W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated's joint venture Spintech Industries, Incorporated is preserved here as well.
The materials in the Notebooks series mainly document consultant work carried out by the W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated and its predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer for a few of its clients. Data pertaining to project work carried out by Swenson Evaporator Company for a number of its clients is also recorded in this series. Information about W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated's research and development work on falling film multi-stage flash evaporators is available in this series. To a limited extent, documentation of research and development work on Spintech Industries, Incorporated's Spinflash Unit 2 prototype desalination machine is also recorded in this series. A small amount of general information written down by Ferris C. Standiford is preserved here as well.
Field notebooks and laboratory notebooks make up the bulk of the materials in this series. Two pocket notebooks are also present in this series. A small amount of accompanying materials, consisting of notes and drawings, are preserved here as well.
Arranged alphabetically by subject, this series contains W.L. Badger Associates' proposal files. A large majority of the files in this series were created by W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated and its corporate predecessor W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer. Two files apparently created by Walter L. Badger while working as a consultant for Swenson Evaporator Company during the 1930s are also present here.
A majority of the files in this series regard proposals submitted by the W.L. Badger concern and a few of its clients. They provide information about the proposals themselves and the types of consultant projects the firm and its clients sought out and worked on. The files also provide a limited amount of insight into the processes by which the proposals were prepared and submitted.
The contents of the Proposals files consist mainly of proposal manuscripts and copies of proposals. Small amounts of correspondence, blueprints, drawing reproductions, legal documents, notes, and photographs are preserved in these files as well.
Contains 16 black and white images.
Contains 1 black and white image.
See also E-182.
See also E-182.
See also H-408.
This series contains W.L. Badger's Associates' reports. The contents of the Reports series are arranged into the following three sub-series:
- W.L. Badger Associates Reports – Final Versions
- W.L. Badger Associates Reports – Drafts
- Non-W.L. Badger Associates Reports
This sub-series contains final versions of reports created by Walter L. Badger (while working as a consultant for Swenson Evaporator Company), Dow Chemical Company's Consulting Engineering Division, W.L. Badger Consulting Chemical Engineer, and W.L. Badger Associates, Incorporated. The numbered reports (which make up the bulk of this sub-series) are arranged numerically. The unnumbered reports are arranged alphabetically.
The final versions of the W.L. Badger Associates Reports primarily concern the firm's business activities. They mainly document the consultant work the firm performed for its clients and provide an extensive amount of technical information about the projects it worked on over the course of its existence. A few of the firm's internal projects and subjects of interest to its staff are also documented in this sub-series. The reports in this sub-series also document the evolution of the firm from a single person consultant practice to a well established independent concern.
The contents of this sub-series consist mainly of report manuscripts and copies of reports. A significant amount of graphs, tables, blueprints, and drawing reproductions are also present in this sub-series. Two indexes, a small amount of correspondence, a few article reprints, and a few photographs are preserved in this sub-series as well.