Concern with the class of problems investigated in this monograph began for me as a graduate student at MIT (1958-62) when serving as research assistant to Professor Eric Reissner who initiated me into the subject and whose influence - whether directly or dialectically - is probably discernable in the contours of the work. My fIrst attempt at a systematic derivation of the equations of shell theory was made while on a summer assistantship with Professor Norman Levinson in 1960. Beyond gaining a sobering reali- zation of the complexities involved, I made little progress at that time. In 1962-64 while a Temporary Member at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences (NYU) I made a fresh start, while benefIting from my association and discus- sions with Professor Fritz John. With the conviction that the full integration of the equations with respect to the thickness coordinate, by means of the Legendre repre- sentations, must lead to a clarifIcation of the position of the two-dimensional theory in its three-dimensional context, the necessary computations were completed during that period.
Several years passed while I became reconciled with the thought that the material needed to be organized as a monograph. This was done during 1969-70 while at the NASA Electronics Research Center in Cambridge, MA.