HISTORY OF CIVIL ENGINEERING

Civil engineering is one of the oldest practices

of mankind, which began due to the need of
man to seek new forms of habitat.

Among the first examples of large constructions

are the houses of Egypt, in the years 2700 and
2500 BC, although it is said that the great
builders, who gave a unique design of civil
engineering, the Roman civilizations, which
created roads, aqueducts, ports, bridges, dams
and sewage systems, which helped improve
the quality of life of their communities.

 HISTORY OF CIVIL ENGINEERING IN THE WORLD:

The different cultures marked an important milestone in the development of the history
of civil engineering, since their first steps were given by societies such as Egyptian,
Roman, Mesopotamian, Greek, Eastern and European, which were creating civilized
models from their different needs

For example, some had the need to maintain their cultures and religions, and therefore
believed it appropriate to build large temples that would allow them to continue
worshiping their deities, while others simply needed places to stay to settle in the
places where they migrated.

ROMAN
CULTURE

GREEK
CULTURE
 ORIGINS OF CIVIL ENGINEERING:

The civil engineering term was named in this way to differentiate it from military
engineering in the eighteenth century. The first school of civil engineering was created
in 1747, in the city of Paris, with the name of the Ecole Nationale des ponts et
Chaussees, which lasts today. With the construction of the Eddystone lighthouse,
John Smeaton was the first self-proclaimed engineer. From there, new groups of civil
engineering professionals who continuously met to discuss this profession were
opened.

This was the origin of civil engineering, a new discipline that uses various skills, such
as calculation, mechanics, physics and hydraulics, which allow creating the process of
construction and conservation of infrastructures, such as: roads, bridges, railways,
ports and airports. and any type of construction, what he called the profession of civil
engineering.

 EVOLUTION OF CIVIL ENGINEERING:

The history of civil engineering evolved over the years, from the construction of walls to
protect cities to the first buildings that gave life and importance to this branch of
engineering. Due to the great benefits and developments that it brought to society, the
continuous use of this practice helped to perfect the construction work, creating the
model of cities we know today.

Not only were large constructions created with the development of this discipline, but
irrigation processes were also created, which helped to improve crop irrigation
processes, making them more fruitful and prosperous for commercialization.

 THE CIVIL ENGINEERING IN THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION:

With the Industrial Revolution came many advances in civil construction, since this
depended on the creation of new roads, ports, bridges and factories. This gave much
importance and meaning to this work, because it was the reason that allowed
connecting different cities, making it an important part of today's society.
 THE FIVE BEST CIVIL ENGINEERS IN HISTORY

These are the best civil engineers of the nineteenth and twentieth century considered
for their career and contribution to the discipline:

Arthur Casagrande:

Arthur Casagrande Civil Engineer of Austrian origin. He intensely studied the behavior
of soils and created various techniques for their study, being a pioneer in the subject.

He worked specifically on the fundamental problems of Soil Mechanics, especially the

classification of soils, filtration through the earth and shear force. He is considered
together with Karl Terzaghi the father of the current Soil Mechanics.

Biography

 He was born on August 28, 1902 in Vienna, Austria and graduated as Civil
Engineer at the National University of Austria, in 1924.

He worked as an assistant in the hydraulics laboratory of the university until after the
First World War, when he emigrated to the United States and adopts the nationality of
this country.

In the United States he began working at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as

an assistant to Karl von Terzaghi, and together they would undertake various research
on techniques and equipment for the study of soils. He also works at Harvard
University, where he was president of the International Soil and Foundations
Mechanics Society given the prestige achieved by his studies on the subject.

Currently, the Soil Mechanics and Foundations programs worldwide adopt the format
established by Casagrande as a Harvard professor in 1932, which validates him as one
of the most relevant figures in this field.

Thanks to the first conference on Soil Mechanics

and Foundations Engineering organized by Arthur
Casagrande in 1936, soil mechanics becomes an
essential part of civil engineering, and this subject
begins as an important part in the training of
professionals of this branch.
 Achievements

 The Association of Civil Engineers of the United Kingdom awarded him the
"Rankine Lecturer" prize in consideration of Casagrande's contributions to Soil
Mechanics. He also received the first edition of the "Terzaghi Lecturer" award from the
Civil Society of American Engineers (American Society of Civil Engineers).

Arthur Casagrande wrote several texts on settlements and dynamic loads in soils.

Arthur Casagrande Award

 This award was established by the Division of Geotechnical Engineering (now the
Geo-Institute) of the American Society or Civil Engineers (ASCE) in memory of the
outstanding contributions of Arthur Casagrande, Hon.M.ASCE, to teaching, research
and the practice of Geotechnical Engineering.

The award is funded by donations from the many students, colleagues and friends of
Arthur Casagrande. The award was established to provide professional development
opportunities for outstanding young professionals, researchers and professors of
geotechnical engineering. It is administered by the Geo-Institute through the Honors
and Awards Program.

Death

 He died on September 6 of the year 1981 in the United States, leaving a legacy
that accredits him together with Karl von Terzaghi as the founder of Soil Mechanics.
 Robert Stephenson:

British engineer, known for the construction of several important bridges.

Biography

 After receiving education at the Bruce Academy in Newcastle upon Tyne, being
apprenticed to Nicolas Wood, director of Killingworth Colliery, and going through the
University of Edinburgh, Robert went to work with his father on his railway projects,
starting with the Stockton line Darlington. In 1823 Robert founded a company with his
father and Edward Pease to build locomotives, the Robert Stephenson and Company,
which manufactured a good percentage of the world's first locomotives, and was
operational until the middle of the 20th century. The original factory building still exists
in Forth Street, Newcastle; it is now called the Robert Stephenson Center.

Robert made a good deal with the Rainhill Trials winner, The Rocket. Following this
success the company built more locomotives for the railway line that went from
Liverpool to Manchester and other recent railroads, including that of Leicester to
Swannington.

In 1833 Robert Stephenson obtained the position of chief engineer of the London and
Birmingham Railway, the first railway line that entered London and the first section of
the line of the west coast (West Coast Main Line). This route presented a large number
of challenges to civil engineering, especially the Kilbsy Tunnel, but it was still
completed in 1838. Stephenson was directly responsible for the tunnel that crossed
Primrose Hill. The first locomotives could not afford to climb the section between
Euston and Chalk Farm, so it was necessary for Stephenson to devise a system to
climb the hill that operated by chains operated by a steam engine located next to The
Roundhouse.

The Rocket of Stephenson, which is on display at the Science Museum in London.

Robert Stephenson was an internationally recognized expert for railway issues. For
example, he was an advisor to the French engineer friend of his, Paulin Talabot, for the
construction of the railway from Gard de Beaucaire to Alés in France between 1837
and 1840. He traveled to Spain to advise during the construction of the Vizcaya line to
Madrid, and also He visited the Orleans railway to Tours in France. He was also a
member of the Suez Canal Studies Society. In the autumn of 1850 he traveled to
Switzerland on behalf of the Federal Government to draw up opinions on the planned
railway network and financial matters.

Between 1851 and 1853 he built the railway from Alexandria to Cairo in Egypt, which in
1858 was extended to Suez.

He built several famous bridges, such as the High Level of Newcastle on the River
Tyne; the Britannia Bridge, with wrought iron sections, crossing the Menai Strait; the
bridge of Conwy, between Llandundno and Conwy; the Arnside Viaduct of Cumbria;
the Royal Border Bridge of Berwick-upon-Tweed and a bridge for road and railroad of
1850 on the River Nene in Sutton Bridge, Lincolnshire.

One of the few mistakes of Stephenson's career was the design of the Dee bridge,
which sank while a train was crossing it, in what was called the Dee bridge disaster. He
was harshly criticized for this design, even before the disaster, particularly because of
poor choice of materials.

As a member of the Conservative Party he was elected member of Parliament by

Whitby from 1847 until his death. He was commissioner of the Metropolitan Sewer
Commission since 1848. He was also president of the Institution of civil engineers from
1855 to 1857.

Achievements

 In 1827 he built his most famous locomotive, the "Rocket", which won an award for
the speed tests in 1829.

The Stephenson Railway Museum in North Shields was named in his honor and in that
of his father.

Death

 He died on October 12, 1859, shortly before he was 56 years old. His mortal
remains rest in the Abbey of Westminster.
 Federico Villareal:

He was a Peruvian mathematician, engineer, physicist and polyglot. Dean of the

Faculty of Sciences and Rector of the National University of San Marcos. With
Godofredo Garcia, it is one of the glories of Peruvian mathematics. He made
discoveries and investigations of great importance in this field.

Biography

He was born in Tucume (Lambayeque) on August 3, 1850, in the bosom of a very

modest family. He began his studies in his hometown and then attended high school at
the San José de Lambayeque National School. Due to the economic difficulties he was
going through, he was forced to work from his adolescence, working as a teller in a
cotton ginning company. He took exams (1870) to be admitted as preceptor of first
letters before the departmental commission of instruction of Trujillo, after which he went
on to direct the primary official school of Túcume (1871-1873). In 1874 he founded a
private primary school in this town, which he managed at the same time as he taught
mathematics in a secondary school in Lambayeque. In 1877 he obtained the title of
professor of secondary education, a fact that gave him the opportunity to permanently
move his residence to Lima.

College Life

Among other achievements, early disseminated a method to raise any polynomial

to any power, through a procedure so absolutely original and perfect, even in the case
of the binomies is easier, safer and faster than the Newton binomial method. In 1877
Villarreal entered the faculty of Sciences of the Universidad Mayor de San Marcos. He
was a student with brilliant grades and obtained a bachelor's degree after two years.
For the degree he wrote a thesis entitled Effects of refraction on the disc of the stars
(1880). Because of the outbreak of the Pacific War and the imminent Chilean
occupation of Lima, he enlisted in the ranks of the Army reserve.
 As a second lieutenant of the sixth company of battalion No. 16 he fought in the
battle of Miraflores on January 15, 1881. Despite the sad events of the war, he
continued with his studies and chose the degree of Doctor of Mathematics in the
University of San Marcos on September 23, 1881, with a thesis on Classification of
curves of third order. He was the first student in the mathematics section to receive a
doctorate there and a gold medal for his outstanding qualifications. Not satisfied with
this training, he began his studies in 1882 at the National School of Engineers, where
he successively obtained the titles of civil engineer (1884) and mining engineer (1886).
In the faculty of sciences Sanmarquina he held the chairs of Astronomy, Mathematics
and Rational Mechanics, from 1880, and in the National School of Engineers had
charge of Physics, Topography, Geodesy and Calculus Infinitesimal. He also taught
at the Military School (1890-1896) and the Naval School.

Political Life

In the field of politics, Villarreal was elected senator by Lambayeque in the general
elections of 1894 and 1912. The dean of the faculty of Sciences of San Marcos fell to
him by election of 1903, and was successively re-elected to the post in 1907, 1911,
1915 and 1921.

Other Studies

He had the merit of founding the Journal of Sciences in 1897.He also dealt with
some subjects outside the mathematical sciences. For example, he became interested
in native languages and even affirmed that there was a nexus or correspondence
between the Quechua, Aymara and Yunga languages. In 1921 he published a reissue
of the Grammar of the yunga or mochica language of the graduate Fernando de la
Carrera (original work of the seventeenth century). He also conducted research on
astronomy in the time of the Incas, including the environment of comets in the era of
Huayna Capac. In addition, he wrote a treatise on The Positivist Doctrine (1891), trying
to harmonize the teachings of Comte with the philosophy of Wronski. Among the 550
titles that integrate their intellectual production, the following stand out: Elevation of
polynomials (1886), Esperanto (1901), Embedded beam at the two ends (1906),
Bending deformation of beams working (1909) and a manual on Resistance of
materials.

Death

Because of its great scientific and civic relevance, the Peruvian state gave its
name to the National University Federico Villarreal. Also a school in Miraflores and in
the tucume district bears his name.

In 1948, the publication of his complete works by the Universidad Mayor de San
Marcos was authorized.
 He died of a stroke in the Lima resort of Barranco on June 13, 1923, at 72 years of
age.

Robert Manning:

He was an Irish engineer, known for the creation of Manning's formula. He was born in
Normandy, France, a year after the Battle of Waterloo, in which his father took part.

Biography

 In 1846, Manning was recruited into the urban drainage division of the Public
Works office; and time after working as a drawing artist, he was accepted as an
assistant to the engineer Samuel Roberts.

In 1848 he became a district engineer, a position he held until 1855. At that time he
read the book "Traité d'Hydraulique" by d'Abuisson des Voissons, from which his
interest in hydraulics may have arisen.

Manning did not receive any education or formal training about fluid mechanics or
engineering in general. His experience in accounting and his pragmatism influenced his
work and led him to reduce problems to its simplest form. He compared and evaluated
seven of the best and best known formulas of the time: Du Buat (1786), Eyelwein
(1814), Weisbach (1845), St. Venant (1851), Neville (1860), Darcy - Bazin (1865) and
Ganguillet - Kutter (1869).

He calculated the speed obtained from each formula for a given slope and a variable
hydraulic radius from 0.25 m to 30 m. Then, for each condition, it found the main value
of the seven speeds and generated a formula that better fitted the data obtained.

On December 4, 1889, at the age of 73, he proposed his formula for the first time to the
Institute of Civil Engineers in Ireland.

But it was not until 1891 that his formula came to light, in a newspaper written by
himself entitled "On the flow of water in open channels and pipes" (something like: "On
the flow of water in open channels and pipes" ), published in Transactions (Magazine
of the Institute of Civil Engineers of Ireland).

Manning formula

Manning's formula, in a nutshell, is an evolution of Chezy's formula for calculating

water velocity in open channels and pipes.
S being the slope in as much by 1 of the channel.

For some, it is an expression of the so-called Chézy coefficient "C" used in the Chézy
formula:

He was also president of the Institution of Civil Engineers of Ireland, after initially
showing his interest as a researcher in hydrology. Apparently unaware of the proposal
of Philippe Gaspard Gauckler, presented to the ICEI (1889), the paper on the flow of
water in open channels and pipes, he presented that they are consecrated as
Manning's expression for free flow studies, which is now recommended for international
use (1936) by the Executive Committee of the third WP Conference, Washington DC In
subsequent studies also proposed other formulas to determine the losses in open
channels and continues to grow in acceptance. He died in Dublin in 1987.

Karl Terzaghi:

American engineer of Austrian origin.

Biography

 Born in Prague on October 2, 1883, he was the recognized engineer as the father
of soil mechanics and geotechnical engineering. From the beginning of his career he
devoted all his efforts to find a rational method to solve the problems related to soil
engineering and foundations.
 The culmination of his effort came in 1925, when he published "Erdbaumechanik",
considered today as the starting point of soil mechanics. He worked four years (1925 -
1929) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he initiated the first US
program in soil mechanics, and made this science become an important subject in Civil
Engineering.

In 1938 he moved to Harvard University where he developed and exhibited his course
on geology applied to engineering, and then retired as a professor in 1953 at the age of
70.

His book "Soil Mechanics in Engineering Practice", written in collaboration with Ralph
B. Peck, is a must read for those engaged in geotechnical engineering. Terzaghi is
considered among the best civil engineers of the 20th century. It is worth mentioning
that it relied on ideas from engineers such as Coulomb and Rankine to establish a
classification for the soils.

In 1911, the engineer Karl von Terghzai (Prague 1883, Massachusetts 1963) obtained
his doctorate in engineering from the University of Graz, Austria, thanks to the
publication of his studies on the construction of specialized structures for hydroelectric
power stations, which were later base of the studies that took it to publish the
Erdbaumechanik, in 1925, book considered foundation of the mechanics of grounds,
and consequently of the civil engineering and the geology. Before dying, and in
collaboration with Ralph Brazelton Peck, he left another work that is considered
inevitable in the library of every engineer: "Soil mechanics in the practice of
engineering".

Guided by his father, an Austrian military man, he first sought his way into the militia
and participated in the First World War. In the Army ranks he found engineering and
construction, knowledge for which he abandoned weapons and began his studies, to
obtain a PhD and gain fame for his great contributions to the solution of construction
problems in large works, especially hydroelectric plants , which were part of their most
expensive interests and foundation for the development of their soil studies "as an
engineering material whose properties can be measured with standardized
instruments". Contemporary builders recognize its character as a pioneer and its value
as a reference that demands that every project starts with a good soil study.

By virtue of the recognition he gained with his first scientific publication, he was invited
as a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he stayed between
1925 and 1929, before returning to his native Europe. In the Old Continent I developed
consulting and teaching activities for nine years, which for many of its biographers were
the most active and fruitful in their approaches to the fine arts and politics. Then, he
gained prestige as a great conversationalist and as a trainer of intellectuals and
engineering professionals.

His main non-technical concepts date from those years and the reason why he turned
the United States into his second homeland, to the point that he obtained nationality in
1943. As a professor and consultant, he was invited back to Russia, a fact that allowed
him to feel in person the realities of communism that by the thirties enjoyed full health
and prestige among certain self-considered "progressive" academic circles. The
contact with what happened there "horrified" him to the point of proclaiming himself an
opponent of the communist regime, which he denounced because his true expressions
were "brutality and chaos". That was the beginning of a series of hard confrontations
with the totalitarianism that Europeans flirted with.

Given his professional prestige, he was invited by Adolf Hitler himself to participate in
the group responsible for the design of the Nazi center in Nuremberg, home to the
most famous meetings of the dictator. On account of that participation, he won
accusations that in 1936 led him to publish his most famous phrase of a political
nature: "The Nation shows me as a Nazi, the Nazis as a Bolshevik and the Bolsheviks
as a conservative idealist. By the way, only one of the three could have the truth and
that is the Bolshevik. " His sentence constitutes for the West a legacy as important as
the one that Engineering had with its soil studies. And it is that she summarizes, like
few others, that freedom and reason are the foundation of contemporary democracy
and civilization, the same ones that were in danger in the Second World War and that
do not stop facing the threats of extremist organizations.

In 1938, on the eve of the great tragedy, he left his

native continent and settled at Harvard University,
where he remained as professor and researcher
until he was 70 years old, when he reached the
age of forced retirement. As a result of his
research, he bequeathed to science five books and
different academic essays. Thanks to them it is
remembered by the hydroelectric power station of
Columbia, Canada; the Karl Von Terghzai Prize,
awarded since 1960 by the American Society of
Civil Engineering, and the Terghzai and Peck
Library, of the Geotechnical Institute of Oslo. For
humanity is a pride a global citizen, with his
academic wisdom and political lucidity.
He died in Winchester, Massachusetts, on October
25,1963.