Abstract
A committee of four ASCE members visited the South Fork dam, took measurements, interviewed residents, and wrote a detailed report. Their state-of-the-art report was completed seven months after the disaster but was then sealed. Its publication was prevented or delayed by three Presidents of ASCE: Max Becker, William Shinn, and Octave Chanute. They were mainly railroad and steel men. Shinn was a former managing partner of Andrew Carnegie at the Edgar Thompson works - the investigation report remained sealed for his entire term as President. Chanute is best remembered today for his innovative research in aeronautics and later association with the Wright brothers. Five months into Chanute’s term, and two years after the flood, the long-awaited investigation report became public during the Chattanooga Convention in 1891. But three of the committee members stayed away, leaving James Francis alone to present the report.
“…and then give them great meals of beef and iron and steel, they will eat like wolves and fight like devils.” Reply: “Ay, but these English are shrewdly out of beef.”— William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act III.
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- 1.
The Johnstown Tribune of July 5, 1889 gave the names of 12 lodgers at the Hulbert House who were saved.
- 2.
Carnegie and his mother Margaret spent summers at their cottage in Cresson over a period of 12 years. Margaret died there on November 10, 1886 when Carnegie himself was still seriously ill from typhoid fever. His brother Thomas died of pneumonia the previous month. After losing his mother and brother in 1886, Carnegie said goodbye to his beloved home in Cresson (Nasaw 2006).
- 3.
Collingwood was a New York engineer who worked for a time under Col. Roebling and also served on the Croton Aqueduct Commission. He was Secretary of ASCE from 1891 to 1894. Died 1911 in New Jersey.
- 4.
Ironically, earlier that year, on February 17th, Johnstown had flooded again when both the Little Conemaugh and Stonycreek Rivers inundated the business part of the rebuilt city by several feet.
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Coleman, N.M. (2019). Investigation by the ASCE Committee (Francis et al. 1891) and the Fate of their Report. In: Johnstown’s Flood of 1889. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95216-1_7
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