Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Sr.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Frank B. Gilbreth)
Jump to: navigation, search
Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Sr.
Frank Bunker Gilbreth ca1916.jpg
Gilbreth in about 1916
Born (1868-07-07)July 7, 1868
Fairfield, Maine
Montclair, New Jersey
Employer Purdue University
Children Anne Gilbreth
Mary Gilbreth
Ernestine Gilbreth Carey
Martha Gilbreth
Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Jr.
Bill Gilbreth
Lillian Gilbreth
Fred Gilbreth
Dan Gilbreth
Jack Gilbreth
Bob Gilbreth
Jane Gilbreth



Born in Fairfield, Maine in 1868, to John Hiram and Martha (née Bunker) Gilbreth, had no formal education beyond high school. From a long-time New England, his father ran a local hardware store. At age 3, after the death of his father, the family moved to Boston, Massachusetts. After high school, he became a bricklayer apprentice and then became a building contractor, an inventor with several patents, and finally a management engineer. He eventually became an occasional lecturer at Purdue University, which houses his papers. He married Lillian Evelyn Moller on October 19, 1904 in Oakland, California; they had 12 children, 11 of whom survived him. Their names were Anne, Mary (1906–1912), Ernestine, Martha, Frank Jr., William, Lillian, Frederick, Daniel, John, Robert and Jane.

Gilbreth discovered his vocation when, as a young building contractor, he sought ways to make bricklaying (his first trade) faster and easier. This grew into a collaboration with his spouse, Lillian Moller Gilbreth, that studied the work habits of manufacturing and clerical employees in all sorts of industries to find ways to increase output and make their jobs easier. He and Lillian founded a management consulting firm, Gilbreth, Inc., focusing on such endeavors.



George noted that the Gilbreths were, above all, scientists who sought to teach managers that all aspects of the workplace should be constantly questioned, and improvements constantly adopted. Their emphasis on the "one best way" and the therbligs predates the development of continuous quality improvement (CQI) (George 1968: 98), and the late 20th century understanding that repeated motions can lead to workers experiencing repetitive motion injuries.


Death and legacy[edit]


Although the work of the Gilbreths is often associated with that of Frederick Winslow Taylor, there was a substantial philosophical difference between the Gilbreths and Taylor. The symbol of Taylorism was the stopwatch; Taylor was concerned primarily with reducing process times. The Gilbreths, in contrast, sought to make processes more efficient by reducing the motions involved. They saw their approach as more concerned with workers' welfare than Taylorism, which workers themselves often perceived as concerned mainly with profit. This difference led to a personal rift between Taylor and the Gilbreths which, after Taylor's death, turned into a feud between the Gilbreths and Taylor's followers. After Frank's death, Lillian Gilbreth took steps to heal the rift (Price 1990); however, some friction remains over questions of history and intellectual property.[4]

Frank and Lillian Gilbreth often used their large family (and Frank himself) as guinea pigs in experiments. Their family exploits are lovingly detailed in the 1948 book Cheaper by the Dozen, written by his son Frank Jr. and daughter Ernestine (Ernestine Gilbreth Carey). The book inspired two films of the same name - one (1950) starring Clifton Webb and Myrna Loy, and the other (2003) starring comedians Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt. The latter film bears no resemblance to the book, except that it features a family with twelve children, and the wife's maiden name is Gilbreth. A 1952 sequel, titled Belles on Their Toes, chronicles the adventures of the Gilbreth family after Frank's 1924 death. A later biography, Time Out For Happiness, was authored by Frank Jr. alone and published in 1971; it is out of print and considered rare.

See also[edit]


  3. ^ "Maj. Gilbreth Stricken With Heart Attack at Railway Station After Talking to His Wife.". Washington Post. June 15, 1924. Retrieved 2008-07-08. "Frank B. Gilbreth, 56 years old, known mechanical engineer and author, died of heart ... Gilbreth was born at Fairfield, Maine on July 7, 1868 and educated at Boston. ..." 
  4. ^ The Gilbreth Network at

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]