Alec Skempton

Sir Alec Westley Skempton (4 June 1914 – 9 August 2001) He established the soil mechanics course at Imperial College London, where the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department's building was renamed after him in 2004,

The failure of an earth embankment for a reservoir at Chingford in north-east London helped highlight Skempton's insights on clay strata. Other projects included Waterloo Bridge, the Muirhead dam near Largs in Scotland, Gosport Dockyard and the Eau Brink Cut channel of the River Great Ouse near King's Lynn. becoming a full-time lecturer there in 1946, and introducing, in 1950, the first postgraduate course in soil mechanics. In 1955, he was elevated to the chair of soil mechanics, and from 1957 to 1976 was head of department and professor of civil engineering.

In situ behaviour of natural clays was of great interest to Skempton, who wrote two papers published by the Geological Society on the geological compaction of natural clays. Among other academic writings, he formulated concepts such as that of A and B pore water pressure coefficient which is still widely used today. Many of his research documents and other writing are available in the Skempton and Bishop Archives at Imperial College.

He was a founding member of the Institution of Civil Engineers' Soil Mechanics and Foundations committee (now the British Geotechnical Association).

Skempton was also an influential contributor to the history of civil engineering. He chaired the civil engineers archive panel at ICE where he edited works on William Jessop (1979), John Smeaton (1981), regarded as the founder of civil engineering, and early fen drainage engineer John Grundy, and started work on the first volume of A Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers of the British Isles, eventually published in 2002. He also won the Terzaghi award from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

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