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ARTHUR CASAGRANDE
1 902- 1 981
BY STANLEY D. WILSON,
H. BOLTON SEED, AND
RALPH B. PECK
ARTHUR CASAGRANDE one of the great civil engineers and teach-
ers of this century, died peacefully in his sleep on September 6, 1981,
at age seventy-nine. He had known for several years that the end
was inevitable, yet with characteristic strength of will he actively
participated in consulting and research activities until a few months
before his death. He was the Gordon McKay Professor of Soil
Mechanics and Foundation Engineering Emeritus at Harvard Uni-
versity.
Arthur Casagrande was born August 28, 1902, in Haidenschaft,
Austria. He received his civil engineering degree in 1924 from the
Technische Hochschule in Vienna, where he served as an assistant to
Professor Schaffernal: in the Hydraulics Laboratory. His father died
in the same year, leaving the major burden of supporting the family
on his shoulders. As the Austrian Empire had been dismembered
after World War I and very little construction was in progress,
Arthur Casagrande's strong desire to work on major civil engineer-
ing projects led him to emigrate to the United States, where he
arrived on April 26, 1926. Shortly thereafter he met Karl Terzaghi,
the founder of soil mechanics, who offered him the opportunity to
work as his private assistant at the Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology (MIT) for the summer of 1926.
From 1926 to 1932 he was Research Assistant with the U.S.
Bureau of Public Roads, assigned to MIT, where he assisted Ter-
zaghi in numerous research projects directed toward improving
41
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42
MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
apparatuses and techniques for soil testing. Arthur Casagrande
developed the liquid limit apparatus, the hydrometer test, the hori-
zontal capilIarity test, the consolidation apparatus, and the direct
shear apparatus. He also conducted field investigations on frost
action in a cooperative project between the Bureau of Public Roads
and the New Hampshire State Highway Department. His criteria
for the frost susceptibility of soils, which resulted from this project,
have been adopted by highway designers throughout the world.
In 1932 Arthur Casagrande began his long association with the
Graduate School of Engineering at Harvard, where he developed a
program of instruction that became the training ground for the
majority of workers in soil mechanics and brought recognition to
Harvard as the world's outstanding center of teaching and research
in that field. He developed the biaxial test, now universally used as
the basic technique for investigating strength and volume-change
characteristics of earth materials, and entered into a lifelong study of
the phenomenon of liquefaction, or loss in strength, of saturated
cohesionless soils as a result of shock or earthquakes. He was an
outstanding teacher, always thoroughly prepared, not dramatic, but
completely at home in every detail. His students felt his personal
interest, his genuine concern for their future, and the graciousness of
his personality.
In 1936 he organized at Harvard the first International Confer-
ence on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering. The success
of this conference established the place of soil mechanics in engineer-
ing practice throughout the world.
During World War II, at the request of the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers, Professor Casagrande trained approximately 400 officers
in the soil mechanics aspects of airfield construction. After the war
the enrollment in his program of courses expanded to 80 or 90
students per year. In all, some ~ ,400 students studied soil mechanics
at Harvard under Dr. Casagrande, and the roster of their names
includes many of the outstanding professors, researchers, and prac-
ticing geotechnical engineers of the world. Few people have influ-
enced the development of a branch of engineering as much as
Arthur Casagrande by his own teaching and that of his former
students.
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ARTHUR CASAGRANDE
43
Through long association with the Corps of Engineers, he
strongly influenced the practice of soil mechanics and particularly
the design and construction of earth dams. His association included
studies of the failure of Fort Peck Dam, the stability of the banks of
the Panama Canal and the possibilities for a sea-level canal, and
consultation on the major dams constructed by the Corps including
all those on the upper Missouri River. In addition, as a consultant
on many of the highest and most difficult dams throughout the
world, his experience and research had a dominant influence on the
trend of development in this field. He engaged in such unusual
problems as the foundations for the Liberty Mutual and John Han-
cock buildings in Boston, the construction of Logan Airport of soft
dredged clay in Boston Harbor, the railroad fill across Great Salt
Lake, and the foundations for the Synchrotron at the Brookhaven
National Laboratories.
His last consulting assignments included the investigation of the
failure of Teton Darn, design and construction of Itaipu Dam in
Brazil (the largest concentrated hydrodevelopment in the world),
and Tarbela Dam across the Indus River in Pakistan (the largest of
all embankment dams).
Professor Casagrande was the recipient of many awards and
prizes, including the first Karl Terzaghi Award of the American
Society of Civil Engineers in 1963, the Moles Non-Member Award
in 1976, the Edmund Friedman Professional Recognition Award of
the American Society of Civil Engineers in 1968, and a number of
medals and prizes for papers before engineering societies. He
received honorary doctorates from the Technical University of
Vienna, the University of Liege, and the University of Mexico, and
was awarded the Distinguished Civilian Service Award of the U.S.
Army.
He was the first Rankine Lecturer of the British National Society
of Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering and the First Nabor
Carrillo Lecturer of the Mexican Society of Soil Mechanics.
He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1966,
served as President of the International Society of Soil Mechanics
and Foundation Engineering from 1961 to 1965, and was an Honor-
ary Member of the American-and Boston Societies of Civil Engi-
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
neers, the Soil Mechanics Society of Venezuela, the National
Academy of Exact Physical and Natural Sciences of Argentina, and
the Mexican Soil Mechanics Society. He contributed more than 100
technical papers on soil mechanics and its applications.
He is survived by his wife, Erna (Maas) of Belmont, Massachu-
setts; his brother, Leo, of Winchester, Massachusetts; his sister, Alix
Robinson; his daughters, Vivien and Sandra; and a grandson,
James MacKanna, Jr.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
foundation engineering
