Until 1900, civil engineering projects were generally managed by creative architects, engineers, and master builders themselves, for example Vitruvius (first century BC), Christopher Wren (1632–1723), Thomas Telford(1757–1834) and Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806–1859).[8] It was in the 1950s that organizations started to systematically apply project management tools and techniques to complex engineering projects.[9]

Henry Gantt (1861–1919), the father of planning and control techniques
As a discipline, project management developed from several fields of application including civil construction, engineering, and heavy defense activity.[10] Two forefathers of project management are Henry Gantt, called the father of planning and control techniques,[11] who is famous for his use of the Gantt chart as a project management tool (alternatively Harmonogram first proposed by Karol Adamiecki[12]); and Henri Fayol for his creation of the five management functions that form the foundation of the body of knowledge associated with project and program management.[13] Both Gantt and Fayol were students of Frederick Winslow Taylor's theories of scientific management. His work is the forerunner to modern project management tools including work breakdown structure (WBS) and resource allocation.
The 1950s marked the beginning of the modern project management era where core engineering fields come together to work as one. Project management became recognized as a distinct discipline arising from the management discipline with engineering model.[14] In the United States, prior to the 1950s, projects were managed on an ad-hoc basis, using mostly Gantt charts and informal techniques and tools. At that time, two mathematical project-scheduling models were developed. The "Critical Path Method" (CPM) was developed as a joint venture between DuPont Corporation and Remington Rand Corporation