Joining nations 1947-1990

THREE

EARLY DEVELOPMENTS, 1949-1954

THE FIRST ASSEMBLY

IF credit is due to the founders of the IIW for the speed and enthusiasm with which they acted in creating the Institute, they are equally deserving of admiration for the originality of their creation. Traditionally, international technical associations had a quite different role from that of the IIW - namely to organise periodical congresses at which papers were presented and discussed. In this context, the concept of a series of international technical commissions working more or less continuously was a new one; it is not therefore surprising that in the early years the officers of the IIW and its Governing Council devoted much of their energies to dealing with the organ– isational problems which arose as soon as activity began. On the foundation of the Institute in l 948, l 2 Commissions were established and these held their first meetings at the Annual Assembly (though this term was not in regular use until several years later) in Delft in May 1949· Only two days were allocated to the initial and simultaneous meetings of the Commissions, and since many of the 130 delegates present served on more than one Commission, attendance was necessarily sparse; nevertheless, terms of reference were established and programmes outlined while the Documentation Commission assumed responsibility for the IIW's first publication - the quarterly Bibliographical Bulletin for Welding and Allied Processes which is described in more detail in Chapter 9. At the time of the Delft Assembly and for some years afterwards, the notion of a conventional international conference was still present in the minds of members; this explains why a whole day was devoted to a plenary session at which verbal reports were presented on the work of the Commissions; unfortunately these are not recorded.