John Frank Stevens Civil Engineer [Hardcover]

One of America's foremost civil engineers of the past 150 years, John Frank Stevens was a railway reconnaissance and location engineer whose reputation was made on the Canadian Pacific and Great Northern lines. Self-taught and driven by a bulldog tenacity of purpose, he was hired by Theodore Roosevelt as chief engineer of the Panama Canal, creating a technical achievement far ahead of its time. Stevens also served for more than five years as the head of the US Advisory Commission of Railway Experts to Russia and as a consultant who contributed to many engineering feats, including the control of the Mississippi River after the disastrous floods of 1927 and construction of the Boulder (Hoover) Dam. Drawing on Stevenss surviving personal papers and materials from projects with which he was associated, Clifford Foust offers an illuminating look into the life of an accomplished civil engineer.

Clifford Foust is Professor Emeritus of History, University of Maryland.

Preface
Acknowledgements
1. A Boy of West Gardiner
2. Beginnings
3. The Great Northern
4. The Panama Canal: In
5. The Panama Canal: Out
6. Interlude
7. Railroading in Russia
8. The Final Decades
Notes
Select Bibliography
Index

Author Foust is to be commended for presenting a complete and unbiased account of this extraordinary mans working life.This tome is a great read for anyone that seeks to know more of the in-depth facts that surrounded the success of this world acclaimed engineer.Clifford Faust has produced an excellent biography that is certainly not hagiography; it is a warts-and-all portrayal. . . . The study is thoroughly researched and Foust used a large body of previously unused family papers . . . Readers of this journal will find the chapters on the work Stevens accomplished for the railroads of particular interest.