Richard Buckminster Fuller created the geodesic dome in the 1940’s. He was a philosopher, designer, architect, artist, engineer, poet, entrepreneur, author, mathematician, teacher, inventor, and visionary. Fuller's ideas are considered by some to be so advanced that the world has not yet comprehended their value. Future generations may yet take heart: Fuller recorded his life in diary form every fifteen minutes for 68 years, starting in 1915.
INTERESTING FACTS
Buckminster Fuller was honored by many institutions, receiving many awards including the RIBA Gold Medal in 1968, 47 honorary doctorates, and 28 patent
invention awards, 28 books, and traveled the globe 57 times. He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Worked simultaneously on plans for houses, cars, boats, games, television transmitters and geodesic domes
He never went beyond his freshman year of college.
At age 32, in 1927 the same year the movie Metropolis was premiered, he was bankrupt and jobless. It almost drove him to suicide following the death of his daughter. But he stopped and decided to live as his life would become an “experiment, to find what a single individual can contribute to changing the world and benefiting all humanity.”
He has also written about the relationship of math and mind between both
Isaac Newton and the
Albert Einstein.
The geodesic dome is a lightweight designed structure made up of interconnected tetrahedrons giving it a high strength-to-weight ratio
He collaborated with Isamu Noguchi on landscape projects. Isama Noguchi also designed close to twenty set designs from world renowned dancer
Martha Graham.
The
Henry Ford Museum acquired the Dymaxium House in 1991 and it took them eight years to clean and restore it. It is now on display at the Museum.
There are over 500,000 geodescic domes around the world.
He took a vow of silence for over a year and this is why: “I must really from this point on just stop talking 'til I learn what the meaning of meaning is -- what do I think and which words do I really wish to use? “
In 1983, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.Other recipients include
Mies van der Rohe,
Walt Disney, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Peter Drucker.
The John Denver song "What One Man Can Do" was dedicated to him.
He was often compared to
Leonardo da Vinci and called "the planet's friendly genius.”
Innovations
R. Buckminster Fuller “Thinks Out Loud”, Society of Typographic Arts, Chicago, Illinois, 1965
DEPARTURE
July 1, 1983: Died of heart failure in Los Angeles, California. He had been visiting his comatose wife in the hospital, and was apparently overcome with excitement after believing that she had squeezed his hand. Married for 66 years, both husband and wife were buried the same week.
His headstone bears the cryptic epitaph "Call Me Trimtab." The word refers to a tiny protuberance on a ship's rudder that, when moved even slightly, can change the course of a gigantic vessel.
After his death the full collection of his diary and notes weighs 45 tons, making Fuller's life "the most documented human life in history," according to Michael John Gorman, associate curator of Stanford's Buckminster Fuller Collection.