Severo Esquivel, a California engineer and city manager who applied his aerospace experience to major projects including freeways, airports and baseball stadiums, has died. He was 81.
When he was hired by Boeing, it was to work on a spaceship called the “DynaSoar.” That program soon went extinct – but not so Esquivel’s talent. He was immediately assigned to the Minuteman ICBM program, and later...
Billy "Bill" Wayne Klotz, a longtime engineer with Lockwood, Andrews & Newnam of Houston before founding his own firm with his son, has died. He was 94.
He was the father of 2009 ASCE President Wayne Klotz, and himself an ASCE Life Member.
Klotz, P.E., F.ASCE, was born in Texas and maintained an active life around both Houston and Victoria, Texas. While World War II would...
Edward K. Rice, founder of CTS Cement Manufacturing Co. of Garden Grove, California, and a visionary who held 26 cement and concrete patents, has died. He was 94.
Rice, P.E., FACI, F.ASCE, recognized that improving concrete structures required progress in cement chemistry. CTS focused on shrinkage-compensating and rapid-setting concretes based on calcium sulfoaluminate. Rapid Set cement was used in the rebuilding of the Santa Monica...
Robert H. “Bob” Rampetsreiter, a structural engineer in Wisconsin who launched and ran Rampetstreiter Engineering for 30 years, has died at 81.
Rampetsreiter, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE, lived a life devoted to civil engineering and to his family, from the time he wrote his Lehigh University thesis, “Compressive Properties of Thin Steel Coupons” through the founding of his own firm.
Early education and assignments saw him travel...
Peter R. Goldsmith, a prominent geotechnical engineer and expert witness in New Zealand, has died. He was 75.
He had a particular aptitude for litigation cases, when with gentle but confident persuasive skills he pitted his arguments against other highly skilled courtroom players and was scarcely known to lose.
Goldsmith, Ph.D., P.E., Aff.M.ASCE, managed the engineering consultancy firm Fraser Thomas, in Auckland, for 23 years, and...
ASCE Life Member John LaPlante, the first transportation commissioner of Chicago and a past T.Y. Lin manager, has died at 80 from complications of the COVID-19 coronavirus.
LaPlante, P.E., F.ASCE, served the city for 30 years in a variety of transportation engineering positions. During his tenure, LaPlante was known for a redesign that straightened Lake Shore Drive’s treacherous “Z curve” and as a proponent of...
Robert E. “Bob” Boyer, a noted pavement engineer and consultant who promoted Superpave mix design, has died. He was 80.
Boyer, Ph.D., P.E., F.ASCE, a retired Air Force colonel, consulted with a vast number of industry clients over his career. Over a 15-year tenure with the Asphalt Institute in Panama City, Florida, he delivered no fewer than 300 presentations on performance-graded asphalt binders and the Superpave...
Emory Leland Kemp, a pioneer of industrial archaeology, engineering professor and founder of the Institute for the History of Technology and Industrial Archaeology at West Virginia University, has died at 88.
Over a well-rounded career, the Distinguished Member was also fascinated by the history of technology. Kemp lectured and published widely, with a special focus on the properties of concrete and methods to analyze historic...
Frances “Frankie” Barnett, the first woman to be licensed in Illinois as a structural engineer, has died at 97.
A Life Member of ASCE, Barnett was one of two female engineering graduates in 1944 at the University of Colorado. From there, she began her career with Boeing in Seattle, as well as get married.
Having settled in Chicago after the war, in 1950 Barnett became Illinois’...
Murray I. Mantell, a visionary, professor and scholarship donor with the University of Miami for decades, has died at 102 years old.
Mantell, a Life Member of ASCE, was the university's professor emeritus of civil engineering, having taught there for 57 years. He was known as a citizen activist, environmentalist and promoter of firm values to his young students. He believed there was always a...
