ASM Headquarters and Geodesic Dome the American Society for Metals in September 1959, the geodesic dome was built on a 100-acre parcel donated by William Hunt Eisenman (1886–1958), a charter member of the American Society of Metals and its secretary for nearly four decades. In 1961, ASM purchased William Hunt Eisenman's Sunnimoor Farm and 400-acres of land adjacent to the ASM campus. The complex was designed by John Terrence Kelly, a native of Elyria, Ohio. There are differing opinions on R. Buckminster Fuller's role in the design of ASM's dome. While Fuller was a founding partner of Synergetics, Inc. and a patent holder for geodesic
Geodesic dome the greatest volume for the least surface area. The dome was successfully adopted for specialized uses, such as the 21 Distant Early Warning Line domes built in Canada in 1956, the 1958 Union Tank Car Company dome near Baton Rouge, Louisiana, designed by Thomas C. Howard of Synergetics, Inc. and specialty buildings such as the Kaiser Aluminum domes (constructed in numerous locations across the US, e.g., Virginia Beach, Virginia), auditoriums, weather observatories, and storage facilities. The dome was soon breaking records for covered surface, enclosed volume, and construction speed. Beginning in 1954, the U.S. Marines experimented with helicopter-deliverable geodesic domes.