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This is the 28th volume of Memorial Tributes compiled by the National Academy of Engineering as a personal remembrance of the lives and outstanding achievements of its members and international members. These volumes are intended to stand as an enduring record of the many contributions of engineers and engineering to the benefit of humankind. In most cases, the authors of the tributes are contemporaries or colleagues who had personal knowledge of the interests and the engineering accomplishments of the deceased. Through its members and international members, the Academy...
This is the 28th volume of Memorial Tributes compiled by the National Academy of Engineering as a personal remembrance of the lives and outstanding achievements of its members and international members. These volumes are intended to stand as an enduring record of the many contributions of engineers and engineering to the benefit of humankind. In most cases, the authors of the tributes are contemporaries or colleagues who had personal knowledge of the interests and the engineering accomplishments of the deceased. Through its members and international members, the Academy carries out the responsibilities for which it was established in 1964.
Under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering was formed as a parallel organization of outstanding engineers. Members are elected on the basis of significant contributions to engineering theory and practice and to the literature of engineering or on the basis of demonstrated unusual accomplishments in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology. The National Academies share a responsibility to advise the federal government on matters of science and technology. The expertise and credibility that the National Academy of Engineering brings to that task stem directly from the abilities, interests, and achievements of our members and international members, our colleagues and friends, whose special gifts we remember in this book.
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BY ROBERT ETTEMA AND SUZANNE KENNEDY SUBMITTED BY THE NAE HOME SECRETARY
JOHN JOSEPH CASSIDY passed away July 31, 2022, at the age of 92. He was a gifted hydraulic and hydrologic engineer whose career trajectory synergized with significant advances in these two engineering disciplines. This concurrence was clearly evident during the two decades (1974 to 1994) when Jack Cassidy led Bechtel’s Hydraulics and Hydrologic Group. During his years at Bechtel, he was promoted to manager of hydraulics and hydrology (1985) and then manager of its Geotechnical and Hydraulic Engineering Services (1993). His professional activities included faculty appointments at several universities.
Jack was born in the remote coal town of Gebo, Wyoming, in June 1930 to Elizabeth and Valentine Cassidy. After his father’s unfortunate death in a plane crash in 1935, young Jack and his mother moved to Montana, where he spent most of his developing years working on ranches that belonged to his grandfather and others. He used the money earned to support himself and his mother during, and for a time after, the Great Depression.
Jack enrolled in civil engineering at Montana State College in the fall of 1948, and in 1952 received his baccalaureate degree. He was drafted into the Army in 1953 and served in the Far East during the Korean War. After returning from the war, he worked as an engineer for the Montana State Water Conservation Board designing dams, pump stations, and irrigation canals. Jack then enrolled in Montana State University in 1958 and began working on his Master of Science in fluid mechanics, which he received in 1960. He then spent a summer at Colorado State University as a fellow in fluid mechanics, working with Professor Maurice Albertson, on whose advice he enrolled in the graduate program at the University of Iowa, where he was a research assistant at the Iowa Institute of Hydraulic Research (now IIHR-Hydroscience). Jack’s Ph.D. dissertation, done under the guidance of Professor Hunter Rouse (NAE 1966), concerned the numerical solution of flows over spillways, focusing especially on flow velocities and pressures. After attaining his Ph.D. degree in June 1963, he took a position at the University of Missouri-Columbia as an assistant professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and was promoted to professor in 1969 and subsequently in 1971 to department chairman.
In 1974, Jack left the University of Missouri-Columbia and joined the Bechtel Corporation in San Francisco. Beginning as assistant chief hydraulic engineer, a year later he was promoted to chief hydrologic engineer, then in 1979 he became Bechtel’s chief hydraulic engineer. He took a brief break from Bechtel (1979-81) to lead the Albrook Hydraulics and Water Resources Laboratory at Washington State University in Pullman and to serve there as a professor of civil engineering. He then returned to Bechtel, and in 1985 was promoted first to manager of hydraulics and hydrology, then in 1993 to manager of geotechnical and hydraulic engineering. During these years, Jack was named a Bechtel Fellow (1986) in recognition of his world-class stature in hydraulics and hydrology. During his career with Bechtel, he participated in the development of many dams and water supply projects worldwide, and he supervised up to 100 engineers in five offices.
After retiring in 1995, Jack Cassidy became an independent consultant and focused his professional expertise on dams and water projects around the world. One short anecdote captures a reunion in an unlikely setting between Jack and several colleagues who had been affiliated with the Iowa Institute of Hydraulic Research. A poorly constructed water-conveyance tunnel in the Sierra Nevada Mountains led to a legal dispute, for which all the hydraulic engineering consultants hired by lawyers acting for the major engineering firms involved were linked to IIHR (including this tribute’s first author, who worked for the side opposing Jack and the other hydraulic-engineering consultant). The judge of the case thought it odd that all the hydraulic engineering consultants came from the same place — the University of Iowa.
Towards the end of his career, Jack received many recognitions and awards for his accomplishments. In 1988, he received the American Society of Civil Engineers’ (ASCE’s) Hunter Rouse Award in Hydraulic Engineering (Rouse became an NAE member in 1966). Jack was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1994, a high professional honor in U.S. engineering. During the same year, he was elected an honorary member of ASCE, also becoming a distinguished member of ASCE. In 2001, Jack received the Ray K. Linsley Award from the American Institute of Hydrology (Linsley became an NAE member in 1976). The prestige associated with each of these awards truly reflects Jack’s contributions to hydrology and hydraulic engineering.
In addition to his 1986 designation as a Bechtel Fellow, Jack received many other recognitions for his work. In 1996 he won the ASCE Hydraulic Structures Medal; in 2002 he was inducted into the Distinguished Engineering Alumni Academy at the University of Iowa; in 2004 Jack received the Lifetime Achievement Award from ASCE’s Environmental & Water Resources Institute (EWRI); and in 2011 he was recognized by Montana State University’s Alumni Achievement Award. Also, in 2013, Jack received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the U.S. Society on Dams (USSD). Additionally, he was an active member of the International Commission on Large Dams, serving for nine years as chairman of USSD’s Hydraulics for Dams Committee and then for two terms on USSD’s Board of Directors. Jack kept active in ASCE, spending 16 years on various Hydraulics Division and EWRI committees.
Jack also co-authored two textbooks and more than 40 technical papers. One textbook, Hydraulic Engineering (Houghton Mifflin, 1988; 2nd ed, Wiley, 1998), was co-authored by Professor John A. Roberson (also a Ph.D. student of Professor Hunter Rouse) and Professor M. Hanif Chaudhury, both of whom were leading figures in fluid mechanics and hydraulic engineering. The textbook is widely used in the United States. The other textbook, Hydrology for Engineers and Planners (Iowa State Press, 1975), was co-authored with University of Missouri-Columbia colleague and hydrology expert Allen T. Hjelmfelt. The textbook remains useful but has been succeeded by textbooks written more recently.
Jack’s ASCE Hunter Rouse Lecture in 1988 emphasized the importance of incorporating principles of fluid mechanics in the design of hydraulic structures. His lecture and subsequent journal paper, “Fluid Mechanics and Design of Hydraulic Structures,”1 depicted practical examples of hydraulic structures whose performance problems were overcome by applying basic fluid mechanics principles related to flow resistance, energy dissipation, and flow oscillations.
Jack led a full and wonderful life. He enjoyed the outdoors, camping, hiking, fishing, and hunting, and he was a loving father and grandfather. He was a carpenter who created fine pieces of furniture and was always willing to help neighbors with home repairs or improvement projects. Following his retirement, Jack volunteered with the Red Cross, assisting people impacted by natural disasters and other crises. For example, he and his wife Alice assisted at Ground Zero for six weeks in 2001 after the cataclysmic events of 9/11; during night shifts, Jack drove a supply truck in downtown New York City.
He loved his family and enjoyed watching his grandchildren and great-grandchildren playing sports and relishing life. Jack is survived by his three children — Val, Jon, and Debra — and their spouses, as well as four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his wife of 53 years, Alice Cassidy (née Willman). Jack will be remembered by his family, friends, and colleagues for his many contributions to society and his accomplishments in hydraulic and hydrologic engineering and research.
______________________________ 1 Cassidy JJ. 1990. Fluid mechanics and design of hydraulic structures. Journal of Hydraulic Engineering 116(8):961-77.