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george W. HoUsNer
1910–2008
elected in 1965
As an “eminent authority on earthquake engineering.”
By PaUl c. JeNNiNgs
george W. HoUsNer, Braun Professor of engineering
emeritus at the california institute of Technology, died on
November 10, 2008, a few weeks before his 98th birthday.
george was born in Michigan on december 9, 1910. He had
an older brother who died very young and a sister who had
polio as a child and died as a young adult. He earned his B.s.
degree from the University of Michigan in 1933. Moving to
california, he received his master’s degree from the california
institute of Technology in 1934. after working several years as
a practicing engineer, he returned to caltech and earned his
Ph.d. in 1941, doing a thesis with r. r. Martel on the response
of an oscillator to arbitrary earthquake ground motion. all his
degrees were in civil engineering.
He served in the army air force during World War ii,
where he did operations analysis in africa and italy. during
this time he showed that bombers confronted by barrage
balloons could safely fly through the balloons’ tethering cables
because the cables would break from plastic yielding before
they could damage the airplane severely. He also showed the
counterintuitive result that it was more effective for a bomber
trying to strike a bridge to approach the bridge perpendicular
to its centerline rather than to take a path along the bridge,
even though when approaching perpendicular one can only
hope to take out at most one span.
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george returned to caltech as an assistant professor in
1945, where he remained the rest of his career. although
the retirement rules in place then required that he become
professor emeritus in 1981, he remained technically active in
the field of earthquake engineering for two more decades.
Professor Housner had an extraordinary range of
accomplishments in research. Perhaps most notable was
development of the response spectrum as a fundamental
tool in earthquake-resistant analysis and design. He was the
first to use statistical methods and techniques of random
processes to characterize strong-motion accelerograms and
to assess the probabilities of experiencing damaging shaking
at a specific site in a given number of years. He was a leader
in the development of instrumentation to measure strong
ground shaking and building response and in the programs to
deploy these instruments and analyze the resultant data. He
also saw the need for research on the dynamic characteristics
of structures, and with colleagues at caltech led the effort
to develop “shaking machines” with sufficient force and
frequency control to excite large buildings, dams, and other
structures to amplitudes large enough to determine accurately
their natural frequencies and mode shapes. To help understand
how large liquid storage tanks respond to earthquake motion,
he produced now-classic papers on the dynamics of rocking
and sloshing of these structures.
in other classic papers he elucidated the mechanics of the
dynamic behavior of inverted pendulum structures and the
bending vibrations of pipelines carrying flowing fluid. He also
did some of the first studies of the nonlinear yielding response
of structures to strong earthquake motion and the role of soil
flexibility—the soil-structure interaction phenomenon—in
the earthquake response of buildings. in the area of soils
engineering, he authored a seminal study of the mechanism
of sand blows, the minigeysers that often accompany major
earthquakes when areas of saturated soils are shaken
strongly.
George was a “real engineer” as well as a researcher,
and his advice was sought on many important engineering
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george W. HoUsNer
projects in the United states and around the world. among his
consulting activities was work on the earthquake engineering
challenges of the Bay area rapid Transit tunnel across san
francisco Bay, the california Water Project, the Tagus river
suspension bridge in Portugal, the first skyscrapers in Los
Angeles, industrial refineries, and offshore drilling platforms
in various parts of the world. for many years he headed the
consultant Board of california’s division of dam safety and
the seismic advisory Board of the california department of
Transportation.
in addition to his broad range of fundamental technical
accomplishments, he was an intellectual leader in a broader
sense. He helped found the earthquake engineering research
Institute and served as its president for 12 of the first 13 years of
its existence. during this time he guided the early development
of the institute and laid the groundwork for the transition of
the institute into the strong and active technical society that
it is today. He also played a key role in the founding of the
international association for earthquake engineering and
served as its president for four years. This organization holds
world conferences on earthquake engineering every four years
and promotes cooperation among the many national societies
active in this very international field. George continued to
influence both of these organizations long after he was out of
office, participating in many of their activities and serving the
role of elder statesman.
One of the first technical delegations to the People’s
republic of china after President Nixon’s visit opened up
relations was a National academy of sciences–sponsored
delegation in earthquake engineering in 1978. This team, led
by george Housner, reported back on the status of earthquake
engineering research and practice in china and on some of
the effects of the disastrous Tangshan earthquake of 1978,
which killed an estimated 650,000 people. This visit also led
to the subsequent publication, in both chinese and english,
of a detailed, multivolume report on this most destructive
earthquake, which george meticulously edited.
george was elected to the National academy of engineering
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(NAE) in 1965, in the first election after that of the founding
members, and to the National academy of sciences (Nas)
in 1972. He participated widely in the work of both Nas
and Nae committees dealing with earthquake engineering,
seismology, and natural disasters. He chaired the engineering
section of the Nas from 1978 to 1981 and committees of the
Nae and the National research council (Nrc). He chaired
the engineering Panel of the National academy of sciences
committee on the great alaska earthquake of 1964, editing
and overseeing publication of arguably the most extensive
report ever produced on earthquake effects on engineered
structures and facilities. He also chaired the Nrc committee
on earthquake engineering research, producing a report in
1969 that greatly influenced earthquake engineering research
in the following decades. later, in 1982, he chaired the Nrc
earthquake engineering research committee reprise of this
effort, producing the report Earthquake Engineering—1982,
which was also very influential in determining the path of
subsequent earthquake engineering research.
He was also chair of the Nae’s committee on Natural
Disasters, which dealt with tornados, hurricanes, and floods,
in addition to earthquakes. after the loma Prieta earthquake
in 1989, which caused severe damage to freeways and bridges
in the san francisco Bay area, george was appointed by
california governor deukmejian to chair the governor’s
Board of inquiry on the earthquake and to prepare responses
to key questions that arose from the earthquake’s damage and
to make recommendations for future practice. The resulting
report, Competing Against Time (earthquake spectra, 1990), is a
landmark in the field.
george’s strategic leadership and excellent research
contributions were widely recognized. The Nae honored
him with its founders award in 1991, and in 1988 President
reagan awarded him the National Medal of science. He earned
the Von Karman, Newmark, and Norman medals from the
american society of civil engineers, in addition to being made
an honorary member. The society also published a collection
of his technical papers in its civil engineering classics series.
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george W. HoUsNer
The volume, entitled Selected Earthquake Engineering Papers
of George W. Housner, contains 54 of his many papers in the
field.
He was elected to honorary membership in several
national and international engineering societies and received
honorary doctorates from the University of Michigan and the
University of southern california. as noted above, he was
one of the founding members of the earthquake engineering
research institute, and that technical society established the
george W. Housner medal in 1989. appropriately, he was
the first recipient. Another organization he helped establish,
the consortium of Universities for research in earthquake
engineering, honored him with a symposium in his name on
the occasion of his 85th birthday.
For his unique role in the field of earthquake engineering,
George was often called the “Father of Earthquake Engineer-
ing.”
george never married. He lived modestly and he invested
well. He left the bulk of his substantial estate as an endowment
to the california institute of Technology, where the funds are
used to provide scholarships for graduate students, research
support for earthquake engineering projects, and support for
undergraduate research and other scholarly activities. another
part of his estate—his large collection of historic scientific
books—was left to the caltech archives.
