Geotechnical News • September 2019
17
COMPUTING IN GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING
From the GS Board
Gordon McRostie died at the age of 95
and was the last surviving member of
those who attended the first confer-
ence. He died before the 71
st
annual
conference or else he would have
attended that conference as well!
Of the 40 attendees, many went on to
have illustrious careers in the geo-
technical field in Canada. Memoirs
(“Lives Lived”) of ten of the del-
egates are included in the CGS Virtual
Archives (as of 2019): Spencer Hall,
R.M. (Bob) Hardy, R.F. (Robert)
Legget, N.W. (Norman) McLeod, G.C.
(Gordon) McRostie, G.G. (Geoffrey)
Meyerhof, F.L. (Lionel) Peckover,
C.F. (Charlie) Ripley, H.B. (Hugh)
Sutherland, and D.G. (Dan) Watt
.
Technical Program and
Proceedings
This first conference consisted of
a series of 28 short presentations
describing the activities in soil
mechanics in various parts in Canada
and abroad. During the conference, it
was also decided to establish a “Sub-
committee on Civilian Soil and Snow
Mechanics” of the ACSSM to provide
regional representation (6 regions) and
act as a Canadian liaison group for
related international affairs.
The 21-page type-written proceed-
ings
6
were published in August 1947
as NRC ACSSM Technical Memo-
randum No. 9 and were titled the
“Proceedings of the 1947 Civilian
Soil Mechanics Conference” (ACSSM
1947) (Photo 3). The proceedings, bet-
ter described as minutes, provided “a
record of a conference of most of the
active Canadian workers in the field of
Soil Mechanics…”.
The proceedings also contained a list
of 12 Canadian laboratories with soil
testing equipment, divided equally
between universities and governments/
government agencies
7
. The proceeding
also listed the names of the regional
representatives selected during the
conference for the Subcommittee of
the ACSSM.
Closure
From the proceedings: “The meeting
closed with an expression of appre-
ciation voiced by Mr. G.B. Williams
to the Chairman for organizing and
conducting the meeting. Professor
Legget replied that the meeting had
more than fulfilled the hopes which
had been entertained for it and said
that he felt that it could and should
be the first step towards most fruitful
cooperation.”
Canadian geotechnical conferences
were off to a great “first step”, and 72
years later we look forward the 72
nd
Canadian Geotechnical Conference,
GeoSt.John’s (Newfoundland) in Sep-
tember 2019.
References
Eden, W.J. and McRostie, G.C. 1987.
Canadian Geotechnical Confer-
ences, 1947-1987;
Geotechni-
cal News
, March 1987, pp 9-11.
(Thanks to Lynn Pugh of BiTech
Publishing for providing this
paper.)
Legget, R.F. 1983. Geotechnique
in Canada, a Personal Memoir;
unpublished manuscript on the
CGS website
accessed June 2019.
Associate Committee of Snow and Ice
Mechanics. 1947. Proceedings of
the 1947 Civilian Soil Mechanics
Conference, Technical Memo-
randum No. 9, National Research
Council, Ottawa.
La première Conférence canadienne de géotechnique (1947)
Doug VanDine
Cet article est une contribution du
Comité sur le patrimoine de la SCG,
dont M. VanDine est membre.
Introduction
La conférence annuelle de la Société
canadienne de géotechnique est l’une
des premières, sinon la première
conférence géotechnique à avoir été
créée, et ce, à l’échelle mondiale. La
conférence de cette année,
GéoStJohn’s (Terre-Neuve-et-Labra-
dor) 2019, sera la 72
e
. Au fil des ans,
les conférences ont eu différents noms,
ont été planifiées et ont été tenues
par différentes organisations liées
à la SCG, et se sont déroulées sous
différents formats. Cet article raconte
brièvement l’histoire de la première
Conférence canadienne de géotech-
nique tenue à Ottawa en 1947.
Photo 3: Cover of the 1947
Proceedings. Couverture des
comptes-rendus de 1947.
