Charles D. Wrege

Charles D. Wrege (March 11, 1924 – August 19, 2014) was an American management historian, and Professor at Rutgers University. He is known for his contributions to management history, especially his critical work on Frederick W. Taylor and scientific management.

Biography Born and raised in Newark, New Jersey, Wrege attended Newark Arts High School. In World War II he joined the United States Army Air Forces, where he was deployed to the Pacific Theater and served as photographer in the Twentieth Air Force.

In his later years Wrege supplied Steven D. Levitt and John A. List with unpublished information and background data for their research later published in the 2011 article "Was There Really a Hawthorne Effect at the Hawthorne Plant?."

F.W. Taylor and the principles of scientific management Casting pig iron, Iroquois smelter, Chicago, between 1890 and 1901. In the 1970s Wrege conducted further research into the origins of scientific management, especially on the pig-iron experiments by Frederick W. Taylor's. The pig-iron experiments on the loading of pig-iron were conducted by Taylor in 1899. Wrege and Perroni (1974) found out that

In 1991 Wrege and a colleague management historian Ron Greenwood (d. 1995) published a more general work on the myth and reality of Frederick W. Taylor as father of scientific management.

Graphic history of Scientific Management 1856–1929

During his historical studies of scientific management, Wrege developed a growing interest in the graphic history of Scientific Management, which he dated from 1856 to 1929. The year of 1856 apparently signified the origin, and this is the same year in which Daniel McCallum published the first modern organizational chart of the New York & Erie Railroad drawn by George Holt Henshaw.

This organizational chart was thought lost for years, until Alfred D. Chandler Jr. had suggested its existence. Chandler had unsuccessfully searched for it, which inspired Wrege to follow into his footsteps. After many years of research Wrege and Guidon Sorbo Jr. (1950 - ) located one last specimen at the Library of Congress in 2005 (see image).

Selected publications Charles D. Wrege, Facts and Fallacies of Hawthorne, Doctoral Dissertation. 1961; republished 1986. Wrege, Charles D., and Ronald G. Greenwood. Frederick W. Taylor, the father of scientific management: myth and reality. Irwin Professional Pub, 1991.

Articles, a selection Wrege, Charles D., and Amedeo G. Perroni. "Taylor's pig-tale: A historical analysis of Frederick W. Taylor's pig-iron experiments." Academy of Management Journal 17.1 (1974): 6–27. Wrege, Charles D. "Solving Mayo's Mystery: The First Complete Account of the Origin of the Hawthorne Studies-The Forgotten Contributions of CE Snow and H. Hibarger." Academy of Management Proceedings. Vol. 1976. No. 1. Academy of Management, 1976. Wrege, Charles D., and Anne Marie Stotka. "Cooke creates a classic: the story behind FW Taylor's principles of scientific management." Academy of Management Review 3.4 (1978): 736–749. Wrege, Charles D., Regina A. Greenwood, and Sakae Hata. "What we do not know about management history: Some categories of research and methods to uncover management history mysteries." Journal of Management History 5.7 (1999): 414–424. Wrege, Charles D., and Richard M. Hodgetts. "Frederick W. Taylor's 1899 pig iron observations: Examining fact, fiction, and lessons for the new millennium." Academy of Management Journal 43.6 (2000): 1283–1291.