[3] Hounshell studied electrical engineering at Southern Methodist University, receiving a B.S.
He then changed fields and enrolled in the University of Delaware's history program earning a M.S.
[citation needed] In the year 1987/88 he was a Marvin Bower Fellow at Harvard Business School.
His From the American System to Mass Production, 1800–1932 was awarded 's 1987 Dexter Prize by the Society for the History of Technology.
[4] In 2007 the Society for the History of Technology also awarded him its highest prize, the Leonardo da Vinci Medal.