office (where, as in the old saying, if the pistol of his argument misfired, he beat you down with its butt end) that he belonged in that select class. On the occasion of the establishment of the Chester and Helen Siess Professorship in Civil Engineering at the University of Illinois, he said, “If someone asks me what I think was my most important contribution to the profession, I will cite the engineers I have taught.”

Dr. Siess passed away in Savoy, Illinois, a suburb of Urbana-Champaign, on January 14, 2004. He is survived by his daughter and son-in-law, Judith Ann and Stephen Bremseth of Cleveland, Ohio, and an “adopted” son, Larry Jackson. Larry, the grandson of a long-time cleaning lady, attended the University of Illinois through the generosity of Chester and Helen Siess. The Siesses considered Larry the son they never had, and Larry regarded them as his own parents.