Having paid their annual fee of five-dollars, CSI’s members immediately worked on finding ways to improve communication with architects and to promote specification writing courses in universities and colleges. Chapters began to form, with metropolitan New York first out of the gate in 1951, and Washington, D.C., Chicago, and Los Angeles soon following. By its 10th anniversary, CSI numbered 1,500 members, spread across a dozen chapters. Now, more than a half-century later, there are 10 times the members and 146 chapters.
In 1956, CSI President J. Norman Hunter submitted a comprehensive plan to establish a permanent staff. Three years later, George F. Lamb became the institute’s first executive secretary, and proposed a structure that included 11 standing committees, from administrative affairs and public relations,
to ethics and rules and education. Along with creating 12 geographic regions for the institute, Hunter was also responsible for the first CSI conference the following year—a co-sponsored event with the American Institute of Architects (AIA).
By 1959, CSI had come a long way in its efforts to inform governmental and private building owners about the need for better and more standardized specifications. It had representation on the International Council on Building Research and Documentation (CIB) and a liaison committee with the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). Collaborating and cooperating with other organizations became an important hallmark of its growth as one of the most respected voices in the construction industry. The institute’s diverse, multidisciplinary membership, comprising not only specifiers, but also architects, engineers, academics, contractors, manufacturer representatives, and researchers, helped solidify its emerging reputation as the linchpin for the building industry.
Standardizing the formats
With respect to the goal of standardized, simplified specifications, the Project Resource Manual (PRM, formerly known as the Manual of Practice [MOP]) and MasterFormat are arguably CSI’s most visible “products.” Therefore, it makes sense their histories are intertwined. The institute launched its technical program in 1960, with pink sheets, which were preliminary technical reports submitted by the various chapters and critiqued by CSI and other national organizations. These pink sheets would then become yellow (interim) and eventually green (CSI documents).
In 1961, The Construction Specifier ran a series of pink sheets collectively titled, “A Manual of Practice for Specification Writing Method Methods,” as the result of a year-long effort by the Specification Methods Committee to develop a recommended national standard. The eventual manual included the first conception of sections and divisions aimed at creating a well-organized, easily recognizable, and uniform framework.
