Introduction

Since 1950, Survey Subcommittee III of ASTM Committee E-9 on Fatigue has been compiling each year a list of fatigue references. These lists have been published by ASTM as STP No. 9 with the title “Annual References on Fatigue.” The lists contain authors, article or report title, reference source and other reference information, and in some cases abstracts of the articles. Efforts of the subcommittee during early years were confined to collecting references from the more popular reference sources. However, during the past several years, the efforts of Subcommittee III have been more inclusive so that each year a larger number of references are included in the “Annual References on Fatigue.” To give some idea of growth, the first STP, 9, contained about 125 references; in 1959, STP 9-J contained about 400 references. Some of this growth understandably represents increased emphasis on research in the broad field of fatigue. In 1957, Mr. R. E. Peterson, then chairman of Committee E-9, suggested that it might be valuable to compile the references in five- or ten-year bibliographies. Committee E-9 members indicated a real interest in the suggestion and Subcommittee III was assigned the responsibility. In the early planning stages, it was generally agreed that such a bibliography would be more useful if it contained a subject index. A tentative index was drawn up by Subcommittee III and was published in the ASTM Bulletin, April, 1958. Based upon comments received, the index was revised somewhat and was adopted by Committee E-9 at the Annual Meeting, 1958. The complete subject index appears on p. 45. Since 1957, Subcommittee III members have been reviewing each reference to verify that the information was correct. This activity is considerably more than half completed for the ten-year period 1950 to 1959. Rather than delay publication further, it has been decided to issue the bibliography to include the first five years, 1950 to 1954. Publication of the second five-year bibliography probably will occur within the next two years.