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CONNECT IONST h e E E R I O r a l H i s t o r y S e r i e s

Nicholas E Forell


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Nicholas E ForellJoseph P. Nicoletti, Interviewer

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute


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Editor: Gail Hynes Shea, Albany, CACover and book design: Laura H. Moger, Moorpark, CA

Copyright 02000 by the Earthquake Engineering Research Instituteand the Regents of the University of California.All rights reserved. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, arereserved to the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute and the Bancroft Library of theUniversity of California a t Berkeley. No part may be reproduced, quoted, or transmitted inany form without the written permission of the executive director of the Earthquake Engi-neering Research Institute or the Director of the Bancroft Library of the University ofCalifornia a t Berkeley. Requests for permission to quote for publication should includeidentification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, andidentification of the user.The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the oral history subject and do notnecessarily reflect the opinions or policies of the Earthquake Engineering Research Instituteor the University of California.Published by the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute

499 14th Street, Suite 320Oakland, CA 94612-1934Tel: (510) 451-0905E-Mail: [email protected] site: http://www.eeri.org

Fax: (510) 451-5411

EERI Publication No.: OHS-7ISBN (pbk.): 0-943 198-98-4Library of Congress Cataloging-in-PublicationDataNicoletti, Joseph P.

Nicholas F. Forell /Joseph P. Nicoletti, interviewer.ISBN: 0-943 198-98-4

p. cm - Connections: the EERI oral history series)1. Forell, Nicholas F.-Interviews. 2. Civil engineers-California-Interviews.

3. Earthquake engineering-California-History. 4. Earthquake resistant design-History.I. Forell, Nicholas F. 11.Title. 111.Series.TA140.F65 N53 1999624'.092-d~2

99-054561

Printed in the United States of America1 2 3 4 5 6 0605 0403 02 0100


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AcknowledgmentsThe help, encouragement, and editorial feedback of EERI Executive DirectorSusan K. Tubbesing and the EERI Board of Directors were instrumental inboth establishingConnections: The EERI Oral History Series and in bringing thisvolume to publication.EERI also gratefully acknowledges partial funding of this project by theFederal Emergency Management Agency (FEW).

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The EERI OralHistorv SeriesJ

T hi s is the seventh volume in Connections: The EERI Oral History Series. T he EarthquakeEngineering R esearch Institute (EE RI) initiated this series to preserve the recollections ofsome of those w ho have pioneered in earthquake engineering and seismic design. T h e field ofearthquake engineering has u ndergone significant, even revolutionary, changes sinceindividuals first began dunk ing about how to design structures th at w ould survive earthquakes.T h e engineers who led in malung these changes and shaped seismic design theory andpractice have fascinating stories. Connections: The EERI Oral History Series is a vehicle fortransmitting their impressions and experiences, their reflections o n th e events and individ-uals that influenced th eir thinking, their ideas and theories, and th eir recollections of theways in which they w ent a bout solving problems th at advanced the practice of earthquakeengineering. Th es e reminiscences are themselves a vital con tribution to ou r understandingof the developm ent of seismic design and earthquake hazard reduction. E E R I is proud tohave part of that story be told in Connections.E E R I was established in 1949 as a mem bership organization to encourage research,investigate the effects of destructive earthquakes and th e causes of building failures, and bringresearch scientists and practicing engineers togeth er to solve challenging engineeringproblems thro ugh exchange of information, research results, and theories. I n many ways, thedevelopm ent of seismic design is part of th e history of EE RI .EERI Oral History SeriesHen ry J . Degenkolb 1994 Wil liam W . Mo oreJohn A. Blume 1994 Robert E. WallaceMichael V. Pregnoff / John E. Rinne 1996 Nicholas F. ForellGeorge W. Housner 1997All interviews have been cond ucted by Stanle y Scott, retired research political scientist,Institute of Governm ental Studies, University of California at Berkeley, except for th eNicholas Forell interviews, which w ere d one by Joseph P. Nicoletti. O th er interviewscompleted o r nearing com pletion include:LeRoy Crandall George A. (Art) Sedgewick Ralph M cLea nW or k o n several other interviews is in progress.

199819992000

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ForewordI was pleased that Nick Forell wanted me to conduct his oral history interview, but I wasreluctant because I thought it would be very difficult for both of us, knowing that Nick hadterminal cancer. Nick was very open and up front about his cancer, and we both knew that,for him, time was very limited. Although I had known Nick for more than 20 years and weshared many experiences, our friendship was primarily based on shared professionalinterests, and I knew little about his family and other interests.I first got to know Nick Forell shortly after the Oaxaca earthquake of November 1978.John Blume, as president of EERI, appointed Nick, Neville Donovan, and me to conduct areconnaissance for EEFX I had previously known Nick only as Eric Elsessers partner (Erichad worked with our firm prior to starting his own). Nick had originally impressed me asbeing a little stodgy, so I thought our reconnaissance trip was going to be all business. Aftertwo weeks of chasing earthquake damage in southern Mexico over rugged mountain roadsand in primitive villages, I found that Nick was adventurous, humorous, and a very enjoy-able companion. While we were in Oaxaca, Nick contracted a near-fatal hepatitis infection,probably from tainted seafood. Five months later, he was still recovering when theGuerrero earthquake occurred in March 1979. Because of the similarity of damage in thetwo earthquakes, it was suggested that the same reconnaissance team investigate. I didntthink Nick was well enough to go, but he insisted, and limiting himself to two beers a day,we conducted the reconnaissance.In 1990, Nick and 1co-chaired a peer review panel appointed by Caltrans for the retrofit ofthe double-deck viaducts in San Francisco that were similar to the Cypress Street structuresin Oakland that collapsed in the Loma Prieta earthquake. Nick and I also served on theCaltrans Seismic Advisory Board, which was convened in compliance with GovernorDeukmejians proclamation following the Loma Prieta earthquake.Our oral history interviews, conducted in the fall of 1997, went much more smoothly than Ihad anticipated. I think Nick got caught up in past experiences and projects, and it was easyto forget his condition. We finished taping his oral history in four sessions over a period ofabout three weeks. Nick died February 19, 1998.

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Nick s contribution was summ ed up beautifully by his friend E ph H irs h at his memorialservice, H e truly lived u p to th e mo tto of his alma mater, Brown University: to createpeople of usefulness and rep utation .

Joseph P. NicolettiURS G reiner

San Francisco, CaliforniaNovember 1999

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Personal IntroductionNick and I began working togethe r in the 1960s.W e shared a respect for architecture, arespect for beautiful structures, and most of all, a desire for quality. W e pursued our workwith the goal of producing buildings and an e nvironmen t that w e could be proud of. Aftermore than 20 years of projects, Nick a nd I believed we succeeded in tha t goal.Nick and I m erged our separate practices to form ForelUElsesser Engineers in 1969.Fromthe b eginning, we viewed the firm as special. W e went a bout ou r work with th e goal ofproviding thoug htful engineering. N o ma tter what the project was, Nick enjoyed the designprocess. H e co nstantly searched for th e right solution and particularly thrived in his collabo-ration with architects. H e urged us all to keep designs simple, to rem ember basic statics, andto com mun icate with one a nothe r. Nick excelled in facilitating dialogue with clients, archi-tects, and everyon e involved in a project.He was no t afraid to state his position and he expected the sam e from others. W hi le herespected different opinions, sometim es it took awhile for him to appreciate anoth er po int ofview. H e was always a creative partner who urged us to get to th e essence of the problem.T hi s combination of creativity and determination allowed Nick to devote himself to engi-neering for nearly SO years.In 1971, Nick and I took an im promp tu trip to view the damage caused by the San Fernandoearthquake. It was an imp ortant inspection-the earthquake bug bit Nick. Th ou gh he hadlooked at som e of th e problems posed by earthquakes earlier in his career, Nic k quicklyfocused his attentio n o n raising the engineering standards for buildings constructed inearthquake-prone areas.Nick followed the San Fernando trip with visits to several oth er earthqua ke sites, includingtwo EER I-sponsored trips to Mexico in the 1970sand a trip to Algeria in 1980.In additionto th e earthquake stories and many photographs, Nic k sometim es brou ght h ome infectionsand maladies, but that did no t stop him. H e was determined to find out about earthquakes.H e served EE R I and the Applied Technology Council for over a decade. His contributionshelped ForelVElsesser win th e Building Industry C onference Board Firm Award in 1993.Fou r years later, the firm won th e Alfred E . Alquist Award for Lo ngstanding E fforts in

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Earthquake M itigation. H is peers also honored Nick as an H on ora ry Mem ber of theStructural Engineers Association.Of th e many projects th at Nick worked on, several stand out. T h e Santa C ruz Go vernme ntCen ter, designed by ForelVElsesser and built in 1962,was an ahead-of-its-time ductileconcrete struc ture with its expressed concrete vierendeel beams. A couple of years later,Nick participated in th e construction of th e Lafayette-Orinda Presbyterian Ch urch, whichfeatured monum ental soa ring timbers and magnificent interior space. T h e IBM St. Tere saProg ram min g C en ter , built in 1974, was a sophisticated project th at also won several prizes,but perhaps even m ore impressive was its outstanding seismic performance throug h threeearthquakes. T h e Life Sciences Building addition at UC -Berkeley featured a unique con-crete seismic system and was notew orthy for its direct, simple solution. In 1985, the KeckTelescope a t the top of M auna Kea in Hawaii presented a supreme technical challenge. Butfor Nick, th e challenge h e enjoyed most was th e strenous climb ing required to reach the14,000-foot sum mit to inspect the work.T h e San Francisco M useum of Modern Art provided Nick with several challenges andpleasures. It was a unique design and his collaboratio n with architect M ario Bota was mo stenjoyable. T h e fact that th e museum itself was a work of art furth er enhanced his pleasure inthe project. H e was most p roud th at his daughter Anne, an architect, could help him o n theproject by building an accurate study mo del for the office.Nick chose to be an engineer, but he could have been an architect or a teacher. Perhaps h ewas all three. H e was a good friend and a good partne r. He was thoughtful, urbane, andliberal, and possessed a dry humo r. H e was comm itted to do ing the righ t thing, whether i twas in en gineerin g, politics, or life. H e led a very full life and was a very uncommon engineer.H e will not be forgotten soon.

Eric ElsesserForelVElsesser En gineersSan Francisco, California

December 1999

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Nicholas E Forell


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The Oral History ofNicholas E Forell

Family and BackgroundNicolem:childh ood. P lease give us a few words rega rding yo ur familyand background.Forell: I was born in 1923 in a small town in Eastern G er -many about ten m iles from the Polish border. T h e town wasquite old, with ab out 10,000people, and i t still has the oldwalls and gates aroun d it. Quite roman tic in som e ways. I wentto elementary school and started high school there. W he nHitler came to power, much to m y surprise I discovered tha tthere was some Jewish ancestry o n my fathers side, whichma de o ur lives extremely difficult. My father was a pharmacistand did some man ufacturing of pharmaceutical products, an d,of course, tha t was no t allowed und er t he new G erm an law.W e were forced to sell th e family business and m y fatherimmigrated to th e United States in 1938. I moved to Berlinwith my mother, who remained there with me, and I went tohigh school o r gymnasium in Berlin. I have on e brother whogot o ut early and I did no t really see mu ch of him after I wasabout 14years old.Nicoletti:role models o r m entors in your early childhood?

Lets start with a brief discussion of your early

Do you have any fond m emories of teachers o r

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Connections: The EERI Oral History Series

Forell: Yes, in t he early years of edu cation inthis little East Germ an town. It was really veryinteresting because it was part boarding schooland part townspeople. It was very classicallyoriented. I particularly rem embe r a teacher ofhistory and Latin tha t I was very impressed by,an d I think he sowed the seeds of my lifelonginterest in history.T h e gymnasium in Berlin was a totally differ-en t kind of environm ent. I t was a big urbanschool and I really hated it. I have very fewfond m emories, but I must admit that the edu-cation was very thorough. T h e only thing th at Ididnt get mu ch exposure to was English, whichlater on became a problem. T h e focus wasreally on classical languages and Frenc h, butno t much emphasis was given to English.Nicoletti:engineering as a career?Forell: N o, n ot at all . A s a matte r of fact,before all this trouble started in Germ any, Iwanted to join t he Merchant Marines, but myeyesight was poor, an d tha t was o ut of th e ques-tion. And, of course, the political situationmade it im possible. You see, I was branded as amixed breed and they had d ifferent categoriesof mixed breed. I was a benign mixed breed,which meant tha t I was eligible for m ilitary ser-vice, although n o t in th e role of an officer orhigh-ranking non-commissioned officer. Any-way, the war broke ou t in Germ any and Eu ropein 1939. At that tim e, I was in Berlin andremem ber vividly the g reat numb er of air raidsand that I was subjected to spending nights inth e basement of the apartm ent house where wewere living. It was really a rath er unp leasan tsituation altogether. I got o ut with great diffi-

At this point, had you considered

culty. Since I am not Jewish, I did not have thesupp ort network of the Jewish comm unities,which really was very successful in g ettin g a lotof people ou t of th e country. Because of myGerman citizenship and eligible draft status, Iwas unable to plan an escape throug h mostcountries. I would have been detained, I sup-pose, as an ene my alien. So the only way tha twe could get out, my mother and I, wasthroug h Russia. W e took the Siberia Express allthe way across Russia and down to Fusan inKorea, and then to Japan, w here we eventuallygot a ship to the U nited States.Nicoletti: W he n was this?Forell:estingly, by the time we arrived in Japan , Ge r-many had invaded Russia, so I was just an inchaway from spending m y career in th e salt minesof Siberia. Fortunately, I got to the UnitedStates safely. M y father was in N ew York C ity,so my mother and I took the Greyhound Busall the way across the co untry to M anha ttan.W e all gathe red tog ethe r as a family, except mybrother, who was going to C ornell Universityat that time.

T hi s was in the spring of 1941. Inter-

Nicoletti:ished the gymnasium in Germ any? Equivalentto a high school diploma?Forell:equivalent of high school. However, when I gotto th e Unite d States, my father had lost his joband things were extremely tight financially.Iwent to work doing all sorts of fascinating jobs.I was a lobby boy in a hotel, an elevator op era-tor, and eventually an accounting clerk for th eHelena Rubenstein cosmetic firm.

At this point Nick, had you fin-

Yes, I had completed th e Germ an

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Nicholas F. Forell

Nicoletti: W he n did you learn English?Forell: Well, I knew some English, no t a lot,but I really spen t my early mo nths in this coun -try going to nigh t schoo l. I studied English,English history, American history an d whateverit took to pass the A merican equivalent examina-tion for high school. In other w ords, I did get acertificate tha t m y education was eq uivalent tothat of a Ne w York Sta te high school.Nicoletti:Forell:Nicoletti:t ime?Forell:briefly and thats quite a frighten ing ex perience.Thats quite a large place and very com petitive.O ne slip and there were 20 people standing inline to take your po sition a t CCNY. I must sayI have a lot of admiration for that school, forwhat it has done. As I said, th e last job I hadwas as an accoun ting clerk and I started on thislengthy career a t CCN Y, which at the bestwould have taken eigh t years for a collegedegree. As you remem ber, in 1941 the warbroke out after Pearl H arb or and I enlisted inthe Army in 1942, which was probably th esmartest thing th at I have ever done .

Th a t was a t night school?Yes, that was at night school.

Did you enroll in college at this

I went to night school at CC N Y

Military CareerForell: T h e Army was, as I said, a beneficialexperience for me. After I completed basictraining, a num ber of us were given the optionof attending O C S (Officers Training Corps) o rcollege. T h e Army, a t tha t time, had specializedtraining program s in which you would sign upto go to college and then you were obligated t o

remain in t he Arm y for a given length of timeafter com pletion of the studies. I dont remem -ber exactly how long i t was, and since I had noambitions to be a second lieutenant, the oppor-tunity to get a college education, courtesy ofth e Army, was irresistible. I was sen t to t h eUniversity of Pittsburgh and the two optionsoffered were the eng ineering program and thelanguage program . Since I already had two lan-guages, it seemed to make m ore sense to try tolearn som ething new, so I signed up for theengineering p rogram, w hich I mu st say wasquite excellent. It was very accelerated, veryhard, but I think I learned a lot. T h e Army spe-cialized training prog ram lasted only a verybrief time. I t was discontinued and th e Univer-sity of Pittsburgh team was split up. W e weresent as replacements for the 95 th Infantry D ivi-sion, Indian Gap , Pennsylvania. I wasnt toowild abo ut that.Nicoletti:gram that you were in?Forell: Com pletely, just like that!

So they terminated the study pro-

Nicoletti:interest in engineering?Forell:cumstances th at go t me to engineering. I reallyapologize about th at because in a lo t of the o ralinterviews I have read, the great on es in ourcomm unity apparently wanted t o be engineersfrom the very m omen t they could crawl out oftheir mothers womb. T hi s was n ot the casewith me. I really slipped into eng ineering so rtof around th e corner. Amusingly enou gh, afterI was finally in co llege at B rown Un iversityafter th e war, they gave us all a test in orde r todetermine whether we really had t he aptitude

U p until this point, you had no

No, no t really. It was a series of cir-

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in th e field we were studying under th e GI Bill.Of course, at tha t time, I had studied engineer-ing for a bou t two years and it wasnt surprisingI looked pretty good.Nicoletti:career in India?

Tell us a little ab out your military

Forell: I g ot ou t of the infantry, thank G od.T he y looked for a cadre to start a new battalionand th at was the 23rd Signal Heavy C onstru c-tion Battalion. W h at a heavy construction bat-talion really does is install telepho ne andtelegraph lines. Th a t may have given megreater interest or focused me on engineeringbecause it is technically quite complicated andphysically demanding. T h e 23rd Signal HeavyConstruction Battalion was sent to Burm a andour job was to w ork on the comp letion of thetelephone and telegraph system between Indiaand China. By that time, the U S . Army hadjust succeeded in con quering Myitkyina, whichwas a gre at battle.U nd er G eneral S tillwell, the war started toswing south toward Mandalay, but we reallyfollowed the Burma Road and then th e StillwellRoad, as it was called, and the n co nnec ted t othe Burma Road, which went int o China. Wehad to cut our ow n telephone poles, wetrimme d th e poles, we muscled them aroundthis very mountainous terrain and d ug theholes, set the poles, strung th e wire. T h a t wasreally quite interestin g, as a matte r of fact, theterrain was so difficult that our equip me nt wasinsufficient, so they assigned elephants to us tohelp us with th e logging.Nicoletti:Forell:

H ow long were you th ere?About a year and a half.

Nicoletti:Forell: Well, the war was pretty well wind-ing up. As a matter of fact, when it was over, Ihad an accident in which I severely cut my lefthand. I was hospitalized for awhile in Chinaand an infection set in. T h ey flew me over th ehum p t o a base hospital in C alcutta, where theythen treated m e with penicillin. At tha t time,penicillin was very painful and I was there forquite a while to heal up again. After being dis-charged ou t of the hospital, I was sent to N ewDelhi to th e Post Engineers and I enjoyed thatvery much. N ew Delhi is a fascinating city andI had who le crew of local craftsmen a nd techni-cians worlung for m e. Th is was with th e highrank of sergea nt, and i t was really a good life.W e got o ut in a rather com plicated waybecause th e H in du and M oslem difficulties hadstarted and C alcutta was in full riot . We had tobe brought to the po rt of embarkation underheavy guard by t he British because ou r Am eri-can troops had n o weapons left. W e go t safelyon th e troo p transport and came back homefrom th e war.

W ha t did you do then?

Brown UniversityForell:the U nited States and, of course, one of th efirst things I did was to apply for college. Ipicked a num ber of colleges, kind of a strangemix, but the one tha t I was really most inter-ested in was Brown unive rsity in Providence,Rhode Island, which had accepted me.Nicoletti:Brown?Forell: Well, I liked th e campus, I was famil-iar with N ew England and enjoyed living there.

OK, now I was back from th e war, in

W ha t was the reason for choosing

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Nicholas F. Forel l

I also was interested in the University of P en n-sylvania, but for som e reason, Brown mad e abigger imp ression o n me . Its a small school, Ithink the undergraduate en rollment when Iwent ther e in th e mid-1940s was a little morethan 3,000, and it was convenient t o Bostonand N ew York. Also, one of the things thatimpressed me was that they were not t oo fussyabout your past grades, which was im portan tbecause a lot of my records didnt exist fromGermany. I guess th e importan t thing as far asacceptance was concern ed, was the le ngthyessay tha t you had to w rite in which you triedto explain wh at you wanted from college andwhy you wanted to attend Brown University.Well, a t that time I had decided on engineeringan d I liked the engineering education th atBrown offered.Nicoletti:ing that you had chosen a t this time?Forell: Yes, I wanted to be a structural engi-neer. Now the B rown education system wasdifferent from mo st colleges that I know about.T h e college of engineering was small, theemph asis was on liberal education, and fo r thefirst two years it was all general edu cation w ithreally no engineering courses whatsoever. A lo tof physics, a lot of chem istry, and in th e thirdyear you g ot in to hydraulics, even some sani-tary engineering, and I really had t he feelingwe got an outstanding broad e ngineering edu-cation. T h e thrust of the college of engineeringwas very theoretica l. Application was no t theirbag and was no t particularly emp hasized.Learning to use the AISC manual or the con-crete m anual was of little interest. I think inretrospe ct m aybe thats a good te achin g philos-ophy, because those docu ments have changed

W as there a specialty in en gineer-

so drastically over the years tha t whatever youlearned 40-SO years ago really has noth ingmuch t o d o with w hat is going on now.Nicolem:cialty, o r at tha t time , did they have a specialtyin structural engineering?Forell: N o, n ot within the civil engineeringdepa rtme nt. Within my graduating class, thefocus on structural engineering was du ring thesenior year and consisted of only ten students.It was marvelous in that t he senior year wasreally a tutorial. I n othe r words, there were fewclassroom situations, the students m et with th eprofessor in his offices, o r small conferenc erooms, and I thoug ht that worked very well. Idid get curious at one time about lateral forcesdesign and ultimately asked the question P ro -fessor, what do we do ab out earthquakes, whichI have heard ab ou t?And he said to me, Abuilding tha t is well designed and takes windunder consideration really should no t deserveany particular attentio n for earthquakes.Now, th at was th e philosophy about earthquakedesign when I graduated in 1949, which wasntreally surprising, because earthquake engineer-ing wasnt a driving force in eng ineerin g prac-tice, as it is now, but was very often anafterthought. As far as analysis was conc erned,th e em phasis was really on the classic methodsof analysis, which is m om ent distributio n, leastwork, slope deflection, you nam e it.

Do es Brow n actually have a spe-

First Professional WorkForell: W he n I graduated from Brown in1949, we had so rt of a mini-recession in thiscountry, and jobs w ere very difficult to find. Iwanted very much to work in Boston, but

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couldnt find a job, so I went to N ew York,where I also couldnt find a job. I then triedPhiladelphia without any luck. T h en th eopportunity came about to w ork for the Bureauof Reclamation. N ow th at was the Bureau ofReclamation in Denve r and what attracted mewas: one , it was a job; and two, they had a rota-tion training program for one year. T h at m eantthat you worked for four three-m onth periodsfor different departm ents. I worked for threem onths in the steel design section, threemon ths in concrete, three m onths in the bridgedivision-which I really wanted very m uch toget in to and was sub sequently terribly disap-pointed by-and th en three mo nths in an anal-ysis section, w hich really wasnt very intere stingeither, with a lot of photoelastic studies. T h e n Iwas permanently assigned to the Spillway andOu tlet Design Section #2.T h e spillways and o utlet design section wasreally kind of disappointing. It had its variety,there was a lot of hydraulics involved, quite a bitof civil engineering , and of course , the issues ofside channels, spillways, glory ho les and allthose things, but it really had very little appealfrom a long range viewpo int. And then I discov-ered something that was so rt of a crowningblow. T he re was a grou p of people in that sec-tion who everyday at lunch w ent outside to havetheir lunch and play horseshoes. I asked themhow lo ng they had b een do ing this and they toldme, O h, about 20-25 years. T h a t depressedme. Also, I was put i n for a promo tion and wastold th at it couldn t be acted o n because theappropriations werent forthcoming.So, I took a vacation. I was married at that timeto a war widow with three children, so that Iwas a stepfath er of three , and we all wen t on

vacation to San Francisco. I quickly decidedthis was the place to be. W he n I came back toDenver, I got hold of the San Francisco yellowpages and I m ust have written over 20 jobapplication letters-I go t two answers. At o neof the companies that replied, i t turned ou ttha t the principal had died and the firm wasclosed. T h e oth er on e was a tentative maybe,so I was disillusioned. Then I got a telegramfrom t he maybe, which was Sverdrup andParcel in San Francisco. T h ey offered me a job,so I packed up th e family and we came ou t theBay Area.Sverdrup and Parcel was interesting. I mean, atthe time, th e S an Francisco office was a branchoffice of th e S t. Louis hea dqua rters, as it still is,but was no t as autonomo us as i t is now. T h ework that was done there was largely Corps ofEngineers work. Power plants were the mainemphasis. W ha t I worked on largely was bighydraulic gates. N ow these were enor mo usgates on rollers with enorm ous pressure onthem, depending o n how tall the dam was. O neproject, I think, was the H ungry H orse D am inIdaho. Th ere w ere two factors in there thatimpressed me. O n e was that when the gate issubjected to full pressure, it bulges and if th erollers are no t articulated enough, the edges ofthe rollers s tart yielding.T h at is the first time tha t I got to thinkingabout the perform ance of steel under yield con -ditions. It was som ething that we were nevertaugh t in college. Altho ugh I mu st say, one ofthe strengths at Brown was the em phasis on th estrength of material. To them that was the keysubject and I think th at is correct.T h e other thing about hydraulic dams thatinterested m e was tha t there is very heavy weld-

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Nicholas F. Forel l

ing and the pressure is enormo us o n thosethings. So they were concerned, I guess fromexperience, abou t weld failure-something tha twe are now always aware of. T h e way it wassolved in those days was tha t the entire gatewas put in the furnace and annealed-structur-ally. I left B rown in 49,went to th e Bureau ofReclamation in late 49,went to Sverdrup andParcel a year later, and I stayed there onlyabout a year. I wanted to get o ut of powerplant, Corps of Engineers kind of work. O nething that often troubled m e was that in thosedays-at Sverdrup and Parcel-there was n ointerest o n the part of the engineers towardlicensing. It wasnt need ed and nob ody reallybothered with it.Nicoletti:time, particularly with rega rd t o public works.People in the Public Works D epartments inth e city governm ent, state and so forth, wereno t required to be registered.Forell:

I think t ha t was typical of that

Because it was n o t private practice.Nicoletti:Forell:som ething structura l like buildings, so I got ajob with an engineer that I think very few peo-ple remem ber, a Danish eng ineer by the nam eof Kaj The ill. No w Kaj Th eil l was the antithesisof everything that I had experienced in engi-neering before. H e was truly a private practitio-ne r and things were don e according to his wayand n o deviation permitted. H e did all the pre-liminary design. And in a way, the role of hisengineers, of which the re were two or three,was really analysis and drafting . I learned a lotan d I also learned t o bec ome self-reliant.

Yes, they werent encouraged to.Well, anyway, I wanted to get into

I have an anecdote from my time in his officethat I am fond of telling. W he n I started work-ing there , I was given a very complicated trussto design and I got stuck. I knocked on the do orof his office-he had a glass enclosed office-and he told m e to com e in. I said M r. Thie ll,because you called your boss Mr. in those days,Ihave a problem here I cant solve. T h is trussdoesnt work o ut. H e looked at me coldly andsaid Fo rell, I hired you to do engineering, no tfor me to teach you engineering. If you cant dothe work, you shouldnt be working here. T h a treally got the adrenaline pum ping and I foundthe answer very quickly. But theres more t o it-and th at is, I think it is now expected that w henmost y oung engineers leave college and starttheir first job, th ey will be given a men tor toteach them the practice of engineering.Th iel l was a pretty rou gh guy, but by being asrough as he was he really encouraged self-reli-ance and no t to ask unnecessary questions.After a year with Kaj Theill, I asked for a raise.He basically discouraged m e from even pursu-ing engineering any further, and said tha t hewas no t very happy with m e, so I left th e orga-nization. A lthough I dont mean to sound criti-cal of him, he was an old fashioned proprietorof a small engineering firm.While I was workin g in these various jobs-Sverd rup and Parcel, Kaj Theill-I took a lotof night courses. As a matter fact, I also tooknight courses when I was working for th eBureau of Reclamation, and the night coursesoffered at th e University of Colorado w erereally quite excellent. W h en I came to t he BayArea, I took extension courses from th e Un i-versity of California in Berkeley.I took a courseon lateral force design from H en ry Degenkolb

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Connections: The EERl Oral History Series

and o ne o n prestressed concrete from T.Y. Lin .T h e course given by H en ry Degenkolb wasexcellent. T hi s is some thin g that was nottaught at Brown and is terribly imp ortant.He nry had do ne this for many, many years andwas really very good at it.After leaving Kaj Thei l l , I found a job withJoh n Lyon Reid and Partners. Joh n Lyon Reidwas an architec t specializing in educationalfacilities, bu t his firm of a bo ut 40-50 peoplealso had its own structural engineering depart-me nt, which was headed by on e of the partners,Dr . Alexander T. Tarics. I was with this firm forabout five years and I value my experiencethe re very highly.Alex Tarics was a very interesting man to workfor. H e liked to teach. H e was a good teacher,and helped people out. H e gave you a lot ofindependence, so tha t you could do things onyour own. It was very good for an engineer towork in tha t kind of a firm fo r two reasons: onewas the discipline that was put upon you by theState Division of Arch itecture, Structu ral Safety,which provided a very, very tho rough review ofyour drawings and really taught you how tochase forces through the structure and analyzeand provide answers for every piece of materialthat wen t into the building-largely wood framebuildings, although steel frame buildings wereno t uncommon in elementary schools.T h e oth er benefit of working for a firm like tha twas the close coordination between the engi-neer and the architect. W e had an opportunityto get involved very early. T h e fact that thehead engineer was a partner gave authority tothe engineering dep artm ent and there was ahealthy give and take. Ano ther good aspectabout working for an arc hitecdeng neering firm

was that you really learned a lot abou t architec-ture and I feel very strongly tha t to be an effec-tive consulting engineer, you should reallyknow a lot about architecture. Ever since thosedays, I subscribe to every architectural maga-zine that is worth subscribing to, read th emcarefully, and I really do understand architec-tural trends and architectural philosophies.Nicolem:remem ber particularly from that time?Forell:that I remember well was a series of highschools, steel frame schools-in Hillsbo rough,Millbrae, Aragon-all for the San M ate o H ig hSchool District. Th e y were really quiteadvanced because they too k flexibility verymuch into consideration. Largely they were allsteel mom ent frames.

Are the re any projects tha t you

Yes. A project th at was noteworthy

T h e final job that I worked on at John LyonReids, and wh ich I really enjoyed very m uch,was the Gree k Orthod ox Ch urch in Oakland.Its a big steel do m e, abo ut a 123 n diameter,beautifully detailed and designed and quiteexciting to work on. T h at was about the extentof my time with Joh n Reid. As I was about toleave, and let me tell you h ow t h a t all cameabo ut in a minute, the firm was worlung on the15-story Hea lth R esearch Buildings at UCMedical Center, and th at was the first time t h a tI had seen com pute r analysis being used.Th ere is one thing I remember and will neverforget and I have often to ld th at story. AlexTarics came over, looked over my should er andlooked a t the prin tout and said My, my N ickthis is very precise. T ell me, is i t accurate? Ihave never forgotten th at com me nt and I stilluse it frequ ently because it is really true. Th e r e

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is enormous distinction between precision andaccuracy and lot of people dont seem to knowthe difference.Early PartnershipsNicoletti:away. Was he still active with th e firm whenyou left?Forell:from Jo hn Lyon Reid and Partners to Joh nLyon R eid. T h e n it became Reid, Rockwell,Banwell, and Tarics. I had sor t of become th echief engineer, which was a great situation.Alex always had his hobbyhorses-jobs th at hecame up w ith th at h e was intensely interestedin and h e really wasnt interested in all the ro u-tine jobs in th e offices, so he basically said,Fore ll, you take care of that, you get itdesigned, you g et i t checked off with t he State,and you are doing a great job, and g o for it.So, after I did this fo r awhile, which was really amarvelous education for me, it was like ow ningmy own office. After five years, I wen t to Alexand said You know Alex, weve got to make adecision, at least I do. I would like to be madean associate o r sta rt my ow n practice. Alexsmiled at me and stu ck his hand and said,Congratulations o n op enin g your own office.Alex and I have been go od friends ever since.H e was a very amusing man to work for. O nemo re thing abou t Alex: I learned an enorm ousam oun t from him and am very appreciative ofthe opportunity that he gave me.W h e n I decided to leave Joh n Lyon Reid andPartners, it so happened t h a t one of the archi-tectural partners, William M. Gillis, haddecided to leave the firm himself. W e go t

John Lyon Reid has since passed

Yes. T h e firm eventually split. It went

together and talked abo ut our interests andreached the conclusion t h a t we should star t ourown firm, which w e called Gillis and Forell,Architect and Engineer.We had really started from scratch and we alsomade an agreement w here we agreed to workfor one year without any compensation. Inoth er words, we both had saved up enoughmoney o r could find enough money to ride foron e year. N ow it was just Bill Gillis, a part-timesecretary, and myself and even tho ug h th e firmslowly started t o g et som e work, a t the end ofthe year we decided th at we could afford only a$750 bonus. Th a t was the compensation forthe first year of workin g with Bill.As time w ent o n, we foun d business in schoolwork again, and I think this is something th atneeds to be pointed out, tha t this was a very,very good field to be knowledgeable aboutbecause school construc tion was on e of th e big-gest activities in the archite ctural and enginee r-ing work a t that time which was in, if Ireme mbe r correctly, was in ...,when in the hellwas that ? 1958 I would say, 58 yes! N ow weslowly started t o grow, bu t the re was neverenough w ork to really justify ano ther person inengineering, so I basically did all the work bymyself with som e drafting help from the archi-tectural end.Looking back o n tha t period, it again was agood learnin g experience being principal of thefirm. I started going to school board meetings,malung presentations when I had n othing todo, which unfortunately happened a t times. Iwould write a rchitectura l specifications andwould actually do som e architectural drawings,int eri or elevations and all that stuff whe re youdont need to have a great expertise. So this was

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a good experience for the reasons that I reallygot to know more abo ut architecture than I hadever learned from Joh n L yon Reids office.Unfortunately, the firm never go t big enoughand after almost four years, I decided that thiswas really no t going to be a futu re for me andthat we were no t going to grow to the pointwhere there was a whole large engineeringdepartment. I dont think th at Bill and I had thesame kind of goals in m ind. S o, we decided tosplit up and establish ou r own individual prac-tices. I still see Bill Gillis o n a regular basis. Asa ma tter of fact, he is one of my oldest friends.Starts Own FirmForell: No w when I decided to go o ut on myown, again I had an unusual opportunity, andtha t was tha t the Jo hn Lyon Reid firm-whichat that time had becom e R eid, Rockwell, Ban-well, and Tarics-split up. Reid and Taricswent on e way and Banwell and Rockwell wentanoth er. Rockwell and Banwell the n offeredme all of their engineering work. Th a t wasarrang ed on a fee basis, which if I rememberwas 1.Spercent across the board, n o m atterhow small or how large the job.Nowadays, people would be aghast a t theam ount of m oney tha t the architect was willingto pay to t he engineer, but things were differ-ent then. As a ma tter of fact, th e Consu ltingEngineers A ssociation had a fee schedule thatrecommended a fee of 2 percent for publicschool work, which I dont think anybody evergot. Th e 1.Spercent was generous, but weworked for it. M y biggest problem , really, washow to keep up with the work-because whenthey split up, Rockwell and Banwell took withthem a fairly large num ber of jobs and I had to

find myself a staff. T hi s was 1961. I was very,very fortunate in finding the right people towork for me. O ne of them was G ary Gray, whosince th en has go tten an architectural licenseand a practice of his own. Another engineertha t may not be known as much nowadays, wasFo ng Ch an, who then becam e an associate ofmine and a part owner of the firm.T h e work with Rockwell and Banwell startedoff with a lot of public school work, but th enenlarged in to other things. Probably the mostimportant job that I did for Rockwell and Ban-well was the Santa C m z Governmental C enter.At th at tim e, it was a large job-a 5-story officebuilding and a 1 story court building. T h ewhole thin g was con structed o ut of precast con-crete with t he exception of the towers, whichwere four column structures. Th er e were 36towers, crea ting five bays in each direction .T h e building was totally symmetrical, therewere four-column towers that were cast-in-place and from th en o n everything was precast.Nicoletti:percent fee?Forell: Yes sir.

Was this also done for the 1.5

Nicolem: Very good!Forell:T h e framing was precast, vierendeel concretebeams. T h e reason for that was that the archi-tect wanted t he right-of-way for all mechanicaland electrical, and there were n o suspendedceilings anywh ere. T h is was an extremely logi-cal job and like always with Rockwell and B an-well, I was asked wha t kind of a structu ralsystem I wanted to design, so there was inpu tfrom th e very beginning. T h e job w ent welland o n budget, but unfortunately, i t was no t

But, i t was a very novel approach.

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Nicholas F. Forel l

well received by the citizens of Santa Cr uz,who felt it was a bit too mo dern for their taste.T hi s building was built and designed in theearly 1960s, and was subjected to the LomaPrieta earthquake with practically no damage a tall, even thou gh at tha t time, ductile concretedesign was not yet code-mandatory.Nicolem: Th is very close to the epicenter?Forell: O h, right close to the epicenter and Ihave received quite a few comm ents o n it andbasically compliments for the work that we did.We did a lot G f the ductile detailing beyondcode requ irements simply because we felt weshould. Aside from d oing th e work for Rock-well and Banwell, I, of course, tried to diversifythe firm and I guess one of the m ajor clientsthat I picked up was M cCu e, Boone, and Tom -sick, for wh om I began to do small jobs. N owth e next thing th at happened is that Rockwelland Banwell went bankrupt. T hi s was quite ablow to m e.Nicoletti:paying you?Forell:tha t time, had g otte n a divorce and was reallyleft with no thing but m y practice. I reallyneeded the income. I was really in big tro ublebecause almost two-thirds of all our work camefrom Rockwell and Banwell.I got bailed ou t in the last minute by Conv inBooths office. T h e reason I go t that work wasbecause the chief architect for Con vin Boothwas an old friend of mine from th e Rockwelland Banwell period. No, as a ma tter of fact,earlier tha n th at, it was the Jo hn Lyon Reidperiod. So again, th e point I am trylng to makeis that you cant have enough friends am ong the

Because of th e fee th at they w ereWell, you c ouldnt knock th e fee. I, at

architects. So make friend s with your clients!Fr om Booth, we got two big high schools andabout three or four elementary schools. Th isreally tided us over until work starte d pickingup from other clients, such as M cCu e, Boone,and Tom sick. W e did a lot of little stuff forthem, but then came our major breakthrough,which was work for IBM .T h e first major job we did for M cCu e, Boone,and Tomsick, or M BT, as they a re called now,was the C ottle Road Program D evelopmentCe nte r, which was about 620,000 square feet,+story, ductile steel fram e complex. As always,I worked hard to develop symmetrical build-ings with am ple seismic separa tion joints toavoid torsion and stress concentrations.Nicoletti:before you became partners with Elsesser?Forell:hard by the Morgan Hill [19841 earthquake.W e had some strong motion recordings andth e building experienced acceleration waybeyond code requiremen ts, which was notunusual of course, but surprising at the time.After that we got into ano ther IBM project, theAlmaden Research Developm ent Cen ter,which was a very, very interesting job. I guesson e of the things th at saved those buildingsfrom dam age was that we spent enorm ousamo unts of m issionary work with the architectsexplaining to them the perils of earthquakes.T hi s is something I feel very strongly about.T h a t is, it really is the role of the structuralengineer t o teach the architect subtly, but thor-oughly, the problems of structural design inearthquake country. In oth er words, dont just

You did an IBM project for M B T

Yes. Th a t building later got hit very

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do what you are told, argue th e point. Have theguts t o speak up.Forell / Elsesser EngineersForell: About that time, I got together withEri c Elsesser and we merged the firms in 1963o r 1964. I think i t was 1963. Between the twofirms we end ed up with a staff of aroun d 10 to12 people. N ow the way ou r partnership wasrun a t the time was that I did my client workand E ric did his client work . So in the earlystages we didnt jointly ru n projects, bu t th ewhole idea behind gett ing toge ther was reallystren gth and numbers. If you are th e sole pro-prietor, you really dont ever get time off. Ithink we both were naive enough to believethat w ith two partners i t would change, butthen , it never does.Eric and I worked quite well together. We haddisagreements, obviously, bu t they workedthemselves o ut and I think we so rt of came upwith a rather consistent approach to engineer-ing. W e always discussed every job in t he office.Er ic was interested in base isolation very early,but I was a little reluctan t a t the time t o acceptth e base isolation for a very interesting reason. Ithink it was Hen ry D egenkolb who said to m eonce, Weknow so little a bo ut acceleration,why d o you want to trade tha t for displacement,of which we know noth ing ?W h e n I explainedto Henry that, obviously, we could mathemati-cally arrive at displacement, h e looked a t meagain with a smile-as only H en ry could-andsaid You know Nick , I have more faith in th ealmighty than in double integration.Nicolem:rig ht by some of the near-field effects from theNo rthri dge earthquake. T h e velocity pulse is

I think H en ry was proved to be

something t ha t you cant determine by doubleintegration.Forell:was Henry. And w hen th e first base isolationjob appeared, oddly enough, i t was one of myaccounts and no t Erics, wh o had w orked veryhard o n this topic. I was really insistent in com -ing up with a detailing that would permit muchlarger displacement than indicated by mathe-matics. I also attem pted to come up with adetail that would mobilize Cou lom b friction,but t he building never go t built, so I dontknow whether it would have worked or no t.

No, I think you are quite right and so

Nicolem:completed many notable projects, do you wan tto mention a few?Forell: Yes, let m e try. n the early days, a lotof ou r work was research facilities. In additionto the Santa Teresa P rogram DevelopmentCenter a t Co ttle Road and th e AlmadenResearch Laboratory, both for IBM, we did alot of work for IB M o n othe r sites, bu t thosetwo major projects were extremely successful.O th er laboratory projects were Or th o ResearchLab fo r Ch ev ron , th e Vision Research facilitiesfor UCSF, the Life Sciences Building additionfo r UC Berkeley, U.S. W est R esearch Facilitiesin Boulder, Colorado.Ot he r projects that were interesting were theFederal Express He ad qu art ers facilities inMemphis. T h e client at the time was not overlyinterested in seismic safety, th e attitude in Ten-nessee b eing wh at it was. But we succeeded inachieving U B C standard plus by proving th atthe cost burden was negligible. T h e C hevronPar k Office Com plex in San Ramon, Califor-nia, was a challenge. For one, i t was by far the

I know th at you and Eric have

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biggest project for us at this time-1.1 millionsquare feet in ten buildings. Again, most of o ureffort was directed toward obtaining logicalstructures with minim al eccentricities and sim-ple structural forms. In th e com puter center,we used eccentric braced steel frames withbackup mo me nt frames.We started ge tting into seismic rehab as con-sultants on the base isolation of the Salt LakeCit y and C oun ty Building and th at has, ofcourse, become a more and more importantpart of ou r work. As a ma tter of fact, I wouldsay tha t probably SO percent of ou r work a t thetime was in seismic rehab. A gain, experiencehelps because you have to know som ethingab ou t mechanical systems, so that you canaccomm odate and upgrade them in the struc-ture . Th er e is a lot of emphasis on vibration,which has to be addressed, a nd i t helps if youhave some experience in that.N ow the m ajor jobs that we have done inrece nt times are things such as the San Fran-cisco Museum of M od ern A rt, which I mustsay, in retrospect, was probably the most fun Ihave had o n any job. It was designed by th eSwiss architect, M ario Bota, who spoke not aword of English and cam e with his translator.M ario was a very charm ing young architectwho knew n othing abo ut current buildingcodes and also nothin g a bou t earthquakedesign. It was really amazing how we workedtogether and th e effort he made to understandthe peculiarities of doin g a major project h erein the Bay Area.O the r jobs that were im portant were thePG&E Buildings on M ark et Street in down-town San Francisco. The se are two really largebuildings and the criteria were very deman ding,

in t ha t PG&E wanted postearthquake opera-tional capabilities because this is the central sta-tion for controlling all their ro uting ofelectrical lines and gas lines. Very tall order, b u tI think we accomplished what we were trying todo. Th e biggest difficulty with th e project wastha t this building was considered an historicresource facility and th e preservationists go tinvolved. Du e to its historic status, we cou ldno t destroy or replace the exterior cladding,which is all terra cotta, so we basically peeledback the brick behind t he terra cotta, rein-forced it with concrete, and then slit the col-umns so that the re would be no restraint fromthe vertical elements between the top of themullions, and th e botto m of the mullions andthat worked o ut very well dur ing construction.O the r jobs go t us into base isolation. We didthe redesign of the Salt Lake City and Co untyBuilding, which was really the first use of baseisolation in seismic strengthen ing. It was thesecond base isolation job after Tarics Ha ll ofJustice building in south ern California. Th iswas followed no t too long afterward by th eOakland City Hall. Eric handled these jobs,which were base isolated and unique in thatthey were fairly tall buildings, generally consid-ered to be problematic-but with base isolationwe found a solution to that .W e didnt do on ly base isolation, we did o the rmajor jobs. T h e Ambulatory Care M edicalComplex at th e University of California, LosAngeles was in 1993. It was about 700,000square feet, wh ich also included a 7-story park-ing garage. I think is probably the first multi-story parking structure in Los Angeles area thatwas no t post-tensioned. It went through theNorthridge earthquake very nicely.

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N ow weve been working o n the San FranciscoCity Hall, and again Eric is the principal o nthat. W h at m ade that job difficult was that wewere th e prim e contract-which is unusual inconstruction-and basically were responsiblefor all the other disciplines, including thearchitecture, which was do ne by th e San Fran-cisco Departm ent of Architecture.Another project currently under construction isthe State Office Building at the Civic Ce nte r inSan Francisco, which is a IS-story steel framebuilding using dam pers rather than base isola-tion. T h e reason for the dampers is that theState wanted t o have postearthquake operationcapability. T h is was really ou r first experiencein the use of dampers. T h e dampers are nowinstalled and th e steel frame is complete.W e still do smaller projects in th e office. I havean old friend by the nam e of C hester Bowles,Jr., wh o still does wood frame schools and wehave continued to do his engineering, so wehave not forgotten the old ways.Structural EngineersAssociation of CaliforniaForell:started t o become involved in the professionalorganizations and let me just give a quick reci-tation o n the history of that.M y first real involvement with the StructuralEngineers Association, which I oddly enoughdid no t join until I got m y structural licensebecause I was under the mistaken impressionth at a license was required, so I didnt reallysign up until 1958 when I got m y structuralticket. M y first involvement with th e S tructuralEngineers Association of California (SEO AC)

N ow w hile all this was going on, I

was a com mittee called th e Professional Prac-tice Committee. It was sor t of that end of th eStructural Engineers Association that con-cerned itself with the practices of structuralengin eering offices rather than just individualmem bers. About tha t time, I got tapped to th eSeismology Comm ittee [of SEAOC ].I had belonged to the Seismology Co mm itteefor some time when I was picked as Vice Ch air-man. It was really Fritz M atthiesens doing,getting me appointed. I was somew hat in aweof that assignment because I had never consid-ered myself as an analyst, mo re as a designer,and was a little concerned th at I might not betheoretically qualified, but that didnt turn outto be a problem.W h at was interesting was th at after havingbeen C hairman of the local Seismology Co m -mittee, I then ended u p o n the state SeismologyCommittee and I found tha t fascinating. H er ewas an opportunity to m eet people from o therparts of th e state and to really observe the dif-ference in philosophy between north and south,which I think was exaggerated. At the time,the re was a lot of suspicion between nor ther nand southern California that was unfounded inmy opinion. It was back around 1980, tha tperiod. I think th ere was a lot of talk that wasreally semantics and m aybe there was a ten-dency on the part of the southern engineers tohave mo re reliance on analysis rather thandesign. I guess they all thoug ht us to be veryold fashioned in our ways.W h e n I was on the state Seismology Com mit-tee, I had my first encounte r with the BuildingSeismic Safety Com mission and the N ationalBureau of Standards Ne w Provisions forNational Seismic Design Codes. I was on th e


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Seismology Comm ittee from 1979 until theearly 1990s. T h a t was very interesting becauseit really exposed you to the philosophy of engi-neers in othe r parts of the country, and there isreally a very distinct difference in th e views onrisk and seismic safety-which I still think hasn o t been successfully addressed. I mean, whatd o you really do when you have in o ne area ofthe country a probability of a major earthquakeevery 1000 years and in other parts of the coun-try every SO years. Obviously, the sameappro ach is not valid for both of them and Ithink tha t hasnt really been prop erly addressedto date. I have always been of the m ind, whichis the minority opinion, tha t it would probablybe best to have two earthquake codes, one forzones one and two, and one for three and four. Iwould like to hear your comm ents on tha t, Joe.Nicoletti: T h e 1997 N E H R P w a t io n a lEarthquake Haza rd R eduction Prog ram] provi-sions have tried to address that problem. T he yhave used a 2 SOO-year earthquake as a basis ofthe provisions rather than a 500-year earth-quake, and this attem pts to pick up some ofthese earthquak es with a very long recurrenceperiod in the east and central United States. Idont know how successful this is going to be,but this is what they are plannin g to do in the97 provisions.Forell: Yes, and I must say I endorse thatapproach wholeheartedly. M y time on t he[SEAOC] Seismology Com mitte e was reallyfilled with suspicions of what N EH R P wasgoing to do and it was very interesting to watchthe approach to the whole problem and the sortof slow acceptance that this so rt of thing wasbound to happen.

Dur ing that period, I also served on the ReviewCom mittee for the NEHRP provisions, whichwas still run by the N ational Bureau of Stan-dards. At that time, I was on the same committeewith H en ry Degenkolb, which was a lot of fun. Igot to know Lee LeM esurier from Boston quitewell and have a lot of respect for him. H e is avery interesting pe rson, and i t was good to ge t abroader picture of how earthquake en gn ee rin gwas perceived elsewhere than in C alifornia.Hav ing been Cha irma n of the local SeismologyCom mittee and member of the state Seismol-ogy Co m mitte e, I sort of was oozed, like it ornot, into the Board of Directors for the nor th -ern section of the Structural E ngineers Associ-ation, and I served from 1989 to 1991. I wasmade President of SE AO N C for the year of1988-89, which was a marve lous opportunity. Ireally look back on th at period with great pride.I think, as a m atter of fact, the involvement incommittees and professional organizations isterribly important for a num ber of reasons. Ithink unless you are o n th e Seismology Co m -mittee you dont think as much ab out code pro-visions as you shou ld.And, its n ot only tha t. Its so rt of really gettingto k now your fellow practitioners, fellow mem-bers of the association and I guess gain theirrespect. I often tell people th at if you want toreally succeed in this p rofession, get involved inprofessional assoc iations. Its terribly importan t.Nicoletti: I think th e Seismology Com mit-tee, for exam ple, is very imp ortant for youngengineers so that they can understand what isbehind the code and what its intent is. I thinktoo m any engineers follow the letter of thecode without really understanding it.

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Forell: Thats true and I must say that now,looking back o n all this is, I am a little bit per-turbed th at the codes are becoming m ore andmore prescriptive again. You are quite right in

eta earthquake. Before I get on the Loma Prietaearthquake, let me also say som ething abo utATC [Applied Technology C ouncil].

saying most engineers really dont know howthose codes were arrived at. I think codes-ifyou just look a t our [SEAOC] Blue Book, or fortha t matter, the UBC-have just grown in afrightening manner. I mus t say t h a t I dontreally feel that I understand or know enoughabout the current U BC .Nicolem:Forell:mad e t o simplify this. Its getting to b e to ocomplicated. I remember when I was a you ngengineer, we used to design a lot of glu-lamarches. I mean this was straightforward. Nowa-days, its a major problem and I dont knowwhether it has to be.

I dont think anybo dy does.I think there o ught to be an effort

EERI EarthquakeReconnaissance TeamsForell: I also got interested in EERI and,thanks to H en ry Degenkolb, I was given theopportunity to be on a number of postearth-quake reconnaissance teams. O ne of them was in1979, the Oaxaca earthquake, when we [Nickand interviewer Jo e N icoletti] went to Mexico,and then a year later we had the Gu erre ro earth-quake and we went down th ere again in 1980. Iwas also sent to investigate th e El A snam earth-quake in Algeria in 1980, which was a very, veryinteresting experience. As a matte r of fact, it ledto a job where I worked with Woodward-Clydeas a consultant o n the seismic code in Algeria,basically on practice and construction standards.T he n, eventually, we had the famous Lom a P ri-

Applied Technology CouncilForell: After I left my role in the state Seis-mology Committee, I was appointed to th eAT C Board of Directors, and I was a Directorfrom 1989 to 1996. I eventually became Presi-dent, and served as President from 1992- 1993.AT C was very interes ting because it was trulyan opportunity to direct research in the areasthat would be of use to the practicing engi-neer, and as I have followed i t over the pastyears it is becom ing m ore strongly nationallyoriented than California-oriented. It was agood experience and I miss my intera ctionwith the people tha t I served with o n the A TCBoard of Directors.Caltrans Peer Review CommitteeForell: T h e Lom a Prieta earthquakeresulted in all sorts of activities and on e of the mwas that you and I [Nick and interviewer JoeNicole tti] were deeply involved in was the C al-trans Peer Review Co mm ittee for the replace-m en t of the damaged San Francisco freeways.T hi s was quite an experience and I felt sort ofoutnumbered in tha t the majority of the peoplethat were on the p eer review panel were acade-micians, bu t luckily the re were som e practicingstructural engineers, such as you and m e andEp h Hirsch and Rol S harpe and a few oth erones that sort of kept this th ing on a level keel.It was a very long, drawn ou t process. Pa rt ofthe reason was because I was the Chairm an andI gave everybody mo re opp ortunity to speak his

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o r he r piece than was necessary. But thats theway it was do ne and it paid off, because pa rt-way thro ugh the review, we realized that w hatwas being d one had a lo t of flaws to it. W e sortof bro ugh t everything back to point zero andstarted a more design-oriented process thanwhat we had seen before.Nicolem:tha t came out of this exercise on the San Fran-cisco freeways have been adopted by Caltransas part of their criteria for both new and exist-ing bridges.Forell:end, but how lon g did we spend on that?Nicoletti: Too long!Forell:really a situation whe re people had to speaktheir mind and learn themselves what wasreally needed. I n ot he r words, they had t o findthe solution themselves. I dont think you couldhave thrust it down the ir throat. So in retro-spect, I think it was very useful. Th is eventuallyled to my appointment to the C altrans SeismicDesig n Advisory Board, which was responsiblefor giving Caltran s a means by which t o reviewtheir own processes and procedures and t oassist Caltran s in arrivin g a t their goals. I thinkit has been an extremely useful organization,and of course now t heir b ig task is to retrofitthe major bridges in th e San Francisco BayArea and sou ther n California.T hi s group, t he Seismic Design Advisory Boardwas chaired by Geo rge Housner, whom I didno t really know before. I was immenselyimpressed by Geo rge, who although older thanI was, was a lot m or e with it than I ever hopedto be. It was a joy to ge t to know him and watch

I think that many of the things

Thats true . I mean it paid off in th e

Too lon g is right. B ut, I mean i t was

him operate, which was very quietly, bu t healways go t wha t he wanted. U nfortunately, heeventually retired from the Board.

Managing the Businessof EngineeringNicoletti:the philosophy of managing an engineeringoffice.

Id like to hear your thoughts on

Forell:very satisfied with th e success of Forell/Elsesser. I think it has become one of the pre-mier structural engineering firms in San Fran-cisco, and from my perspective, I have spen talot of time thinlung abo ut how that has hap-pened. W h y have we been successful? I thinkthere are a num ber of reasons. I think th at inorder to becom e successful in any endeavor,and here I am quo ting the great I.M. Pei, Ittakes four things: capability, energy, work , andluck. I think we should not discount luck as afactor in being a success. T hi s really me ansbeing at the right place at the right tim e andthe right mom ent.One th ing I think has m ade o ur firm effective isou r relationships with o ur clients and with o uremployees. I thin k the relationship with you rclient is terribly imp ortan t. I remember back inthe 60s when marketing wasnt even heard of.H ow did we get work? Because we had estab-lished a relationship with an architec tural firmand really wh at happened back then was thatthey would call us and say We have a new joband we want you t o d o the engineering. W ereally didnt go ou t and solicit, knock o n doors,or make cold calls.

Let m e try to start i t this way. I am

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All of this has changed, of course, but there isstill is a large ingredien t of having a relationshipwith you r client that is sympa thetic, cordial,and involves mutual confidence in each other-I dont think that can be em phasized enough. Italked about w hat I know about architectureand how I go t involved in it, bu t its really had alot to d o with the success that I have had durin gmy career. H ar d work, capability.N o w capability isnt just really your capability,but the expertise of th e people that you hire. Ithink it is very imp ortant to screen the peoplethat y ou wan t to hire v ery carefully, and in par-ticular ask them what their aspirations areabou t the ir professional career. Its no t so muchwhat an em ployee can do for the firm rightnow, but where does th at employee want to befive years from now, ten years from now?W her e does he or she want to be eventually?Usually when yo u g et in conversations likethat, rather than g oing through their curricu-lum vitae, you get a better picture as to whatthe person is all abou t. By the way, as a sidelineto that, its very interesting that v ery few engi-neers now adays aspire to have their o wn office.Generally, when you interview people now an dyou ask them, W ha t is your goal? T he y usu-ally respond, Well, I want to be a principal ina successful engin eering firm. Very few peoplenowadays have the amb ition or the guts to s tarttheir own practice.Nicoletti: I know that you talked about thefact that o ne of the functions of the engineeris to educate the client. I thin k its in line w iththe statement that you need to inform th e cli-en t on what he should have, as opposed to w hathe wants.

Forell: O h, I think thats very true. Itsveryimp ortant to educate the client and you alsohave to be able to explain what you are tryingto accomplish as a structural engineer in term sthat t he architect and client can understand.W e are all guilty nowadays of using buzzwordsfor our own terminology-speaking aboutinelastic response spectra-and this doesntmean a thing to the architect.Nicoletti:engineers, Nick.Forell: I am afraid so. I talked about som e ofthe ingredients of success, and another is com pe-tence . Well, that is really wha t we have just beentalking about. To get com petent people and to letthem know that you feel they are comp etent. Asemployers,I dont think we do enough pa ttingpeople on the back. Also,I think you shouldshow genu ine persona l interest in their lives.T h is helps make them feel really comfortableworking with you and your firm.T h e other thing is hard work. Over the years Ithink the w ork ethics have changed. We allused to work like fiends really, kind of nuts. Imean, I dont think tha t my wife even knewthat the office wasnt op en o n Saturdays. I justautomatically wen t t o wo rk on Saturdays. Well,thats no longer the way things a re done and Ithink to really be successful, particularly whenyou get into m anagem ent, youve got to havewha t people call a fire in th e belly, to reallywant to make i t go. Sometimes you m ight haveto shortchang e your personal life in orde r toget your professional goals accomplished.No w luck is anoth er ingredient of success,thats pretty obvious . You have to know to bethere a t the righ t spo t when th e job is there. I

It doesnt mean a thing to a lot of

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think tha t in ge tting work, things have changedtremendo usly. It used to be really the old boysnetwork, where you get toge ther with yourarchitec t at lunch and, in a way, sor t of keep onhis good side. Thats no t th e way jobs get donenowaday s and, unfortunately, I think that moreand more th e team is being put together bymarketing people in offices. I often worry tha tthey can create a disaster and pu t together peo-ple who really are no t com patible, just becauseit reads well o n paper.Nicoletti:made in heaven in o the r words?

You dont th ink its a marriage

Forell: No, I mean its like some committe etrying to design a dog o r whatever that story is,it just doesnt always come o ut th at w ell. Also, Ithin k th at now oth er skills are necessary-suchas to m ake good graphic presentations and theability to o rally presen t you r firm and its quali-fications and expertise. Today, its expected th atyou will participate in interviews o n projectsand make a good presentation. T h e days aregone when th e architect, according to hiswhims o r friendships, would select th e consult-ants-those days are over.W hen i t comes to successful engineering, Ithink its terribly impo rtan t to really get dow nto the fundamentals. I get worried about th eexcessive use of computers. Im n ot saying tha tcom puters are no t necessary. I think they areessential. But the y also have to b e used care-fully. T h e old ways of sitting down w ith a rollof flimsy paper sketching ou t structural systemsalternatives is still the r igh t way to go. Youdont go in there and start off by putting in thecoordinates of the building and start runn ingthe com puter.

Nicoletti: Som e of th e older engineers Iknew would start ou t with the c onnections.T he y would start sketching connections beforethey even sketched the frame.Forell:there is merit to that. Because as Mies Van de rRohe said G od is in t he details.

Thats very interestin g, and I think

Really what p rovides earth quak e resistance istwo things: one is configuration and the otheris detailing. I dont think there is enoughemphasis given to those two things. Nowadays,there seems to be a whole class or elem ent whobelieve tha t engineerin g eq uated to analysis isessential. I agree, its terribly impo rtant, b ut th efundam entals of design are really configurationand detailing. T h er e is no do ubt in my mindabout it.Nicoletti:building.Forell: Thats true.

On ly design can make a good

Nicoletti: Analysis wont make it any be tter.Forell: Let me quote Eph Hirsch. In o ne ofhis lectures, he said, You have got to design abuildin g before you can analyze it. Lets n o tforget that design com es before analysis. T h etrou ble with analysis-which is a good thing-is that it gives us the opportunity to designmost anything, including things that are no tgood en gineering. And I think some body has tobe in the office tha t says Stop it right here.Lets go back and take a look at this. As I lookback on m y jobs, what was really im portan tabout them was that I always foug ht tooth andnail for c onfigu ration. If necessary, seismic sep-aration joints, to avoid those stress concen tra-

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~ Connections: The EERl Oral History Series

tions and problems that you r un in to if youdont do th at.Todays Engineering ProblemsNicoletti: In addition to overemphasizing,perhaps, th e compu ter, what in your opinionare som e of the p roblems that are facing todaysstructural engineers?Forell:today is the prob lem that we have found withmo me nt steel frames [after the 1994Nor thridge , California, earthquake]. I dontthink that problem is solved yet.W he n you really think about where it all comesfrom, I think the problem with m om ent steelframing is really based o n th e econom ics in oursociety. T h e production of steel is completely

O n e of the b iggest problems we face

mo dernism and t he architecture of people likeFrank Gehry, it is not so simple.Nicoletti: Do you think engineers are betterunderstood today by architects than they weresay 20 to 30 years ago?Forell:some ways they are better u nderstood, b ut Ithink architects maybe have a little bit moreexposure to the w hole issue of earthquake engi-neerin g and what works and what doesnt,which was learned th e hard way-by view ingpictures and reading ho rro r stories about whathappens after major earthquakes. O n the oth erhand , they are less understood because engi-neering has become so complex that it isnteven too well understood by engineers.

Yes and no. I would think th at in

Nicoletti: Thats true.influenced by economics. Thats also true abo utwelding procedures. I also think one of theproblems is ignorance, and I will include myselfon that. W hen I went to college , I was toldloud and clear that weld was as strong as paren tmaterial, an assumption tha t really has turnedout to be incorrect. So, solving this issue ofweld strength and steel mom ent c onnections isone of the m ajor problems we have right now.I think th e other p roblem we have today is thechallenges presented by new trends in architec-ture. Wh en I think back to the ~ O S ,he domi-nant influences on architects were people likeMies van der Rohe, and for that matter, theBauhaus. Structural engineering was prettyeasy because architectu ral form followed func-tion, and basically used t he structure as part ofthe architectural expression. Th is incorporatedstructure and architecture. Today, with theexpressionist forms of dec ons truc tion isdp ost-

Forell:days, you know, where you look at th e com -pu ter prin tou t an d like Alex Tarics said, Well,you know , this is very precise, but is it accu-ra te ? Its very difficult now to debu g a job ifyou just d o a con cep tual review-which veryoften has nothin g to do w ith analysis, but withconfiguration and com mon sense-or unlessyou really start off from a parallel run on thewhole thing.Nicoletti: O n a slightly different subject,what are your thou ghts about this move by[California] State governm ent engineers toretain all of the w ork in-house?Forell: W ell, that has been a problem in theState of California for a long time, an d I reallythink its a bad idea. I go back far enough toremember the years when t he State of Califor-nia did all junior colleges and there was a battle

Im going back again to my early

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royal at the time between t he AIA and the Stateof California. T h a t particular battle was won bythe AIA and now private practitioners designjunior colleges. If you lo ok across the cou ntry,there are very few states where the governm enthas a mon opoly for the design of freeways andbridges, and I think intrinsically that i t is no t agood idea.Nicolem:works departm ent has been privatized. H ow d oyou think that would work in this country? InN ew Zealand, for example, private firms do allpublic works projects. Th er e is no public worksdepartment in the government any more.Forell: I wasnt even aware of that and Ireally dont have a very str on g view because Idont really know enoug h abo ut it, but I dothink the idea of desig dbu ild may make somesense. In oth er words, where the team comesup with a propo sal for, lets say, a bridge design ,and th en th e selection is made on cost, struc-tural merit. T ha t is the way most work is beingdone in Germany, I believe, and I think a lso inHo lland. W e have had som e experience withdesigd build. T h e State Office Building at theSan Francisco Civic Cen ter was do ne in asomewhat unusual manner, where there was apartnership form ed between the architect, thecontractor, and the construction manager andthey basically guara nteed the cost of the projectand th e completion date. And it turned o ut, inspite of our apprehension, very well.

In so me countries, the public

Nicolem:Forell: N o, we were not. W e were retainedby th at partne rship as were m echanical, trans-portation, food consultant, and God knows thehundreds of people nowadays that get involved

W ere you part of this partnership?

in doing a major job. But it turned o ut that inorder to meet th e aspirations of the client, thecontra ctor many tim es was very helpful in pre-venting things from developing as the job wentalong because they were too complex or tooexpensive. So I feel pretty good abou t it, and Ido think that as time goes on, we will find th etraditional way of the a rchitect retaining thestructural engineer and having complete co n-trol over the work will change. In other words,you will find different comb inations, workingtogether really becoming the executing elemen tof the development of the design.Nicolem:you have had projects th at involved construc-tion man agem ent. Has th at been helpful in eas-ing this problem tha t you are talking aboutbetween the architect and engineer?Forell:overblown. I dont think we foun d it to be veryeffective. I think i t can be helpful, but I wouldsay tha t ou r experience has been mixed.Le t me say one m ore thing about the practiceof engineering. I feel very strongly, and I havesaid this before, tha t the people in the office arereally the biggest resource that you have. Ithink its importan t that you spend enoughtime me ntoring an d educating your em ployees.Nicoletti: Do you think the universities aredoing a good job in preparing the students foremployment?Forell: Yes, I think they are doing a fair joband I think t he real problem is that there isntenou gh time available. I hate t o say this, but Ithink we are, and I wouldnt be surprised ifyour firm wasnt also, reluctan t to h ire peop lewh o only have a bachelors degre e. I think we

Im sure that a t ForelVElsesser

I am a little bit con cerned that its

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now feel that the masters degree is mandatoryjust to give students enough educational expe-rience. W ha t I think is lacking in the edu cationa t the university is more time t o really focus on,if you wish, the real w orld.Berkeley used to have a practice where theywould hire outside practicing people to givesome courses at the university. I dont think thatsmuch happening anymore. I would like to seejust a series of lectures being given for the educa-tion of engineers where they are told som ethingabou t the practice of engineering and Construc-tion, experiences tha t a re relevant today.I have had the opp ortunity to give some lecturesat both Stanford and Berkeley, and I rememberparticularly a lecture that I gave at Stanford t oan engineering class. I explained to them,amo ng other things, how much of the engmeer-ing dollar was dev oted to what activity andwhen th ey found o ut the small percentageof th etota l fee available that was alloca ted for analysis,they were appalled. T h ey really th ough t analysis

become employed th at there just isnt time.Perhaps its better left to the employer t o pro-vide this practical experience.Forell: W ell, Im very sympathetic with th atbecause, as I told you early in our interviewshere, Brown U niversity, of which I am a prod-uct, had no interest in application, but wasreally constructing their curriculum on a theo-retical basis. It served me well in th e long run .But I do think that with the investment peopleput into getting th e education that is necessaryto be successful, som e courses, or just lectureson private practice, would be extrem ely helpful.I hate to see people go through th e wholeeffort, and figure ou t two, three years later thatwell, thats no t really what they wanted to do. Ihave seen that happen, as a matter of fact. I canthink of a numb er of people who all of the sud-den started going to night school to g et anMBA and then left engineering.The Influence of Others

was all you did. T h e large amount of time o rmon ey that was spent on things like marketing,administrative things, and co nstruction inspec-bad to have people com e ou t of the universitywho do n ot have any knowledge of the field that

Nicoletti:people that influenced your career in engineer-ing. You have men tioned H en ry Degenk olbtalk about some of th e people who have influ-enced you?

You have mention ed a couple of

tion, they just knew nothing about. I think its and YOU)Ve also mentioned Would youthey are trying to enter.Nicoletti: Its also been n oted by othe rs th atthe universities are no longer p reparing peopleto d o a design job. Fo r example, the designproblems th at used to be part of the curriculumat the university are n o longer b eing used. Itmay be that there is so much new informationand, as you mentioned, it requires a m astersdegree even before so meone is ready to

Forell: Yes, I would like to. Back to D egen -kolb. I got to know He nry quite well. H e and Ihad one thing in comm on, and tha t is that weboth liked to have a little drink of Sanbuccoafter technical meetings, and wed som etimesget to ta lh ng about philosophy of engineering.Although I did n ot always agree with H enry, Ithink he and I basically had the sam e feelingsabou t what was needed in structural engm eering.


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Another person who influenced me quite a bitis Igor Popov. W h at I really admire about Igoris his total devotion to engineering and th e verysuperior research work that he has done.Really, when yo u loo k back now o n all the liter-ature tha t is published, some of the papers thatwere introduced by Igor, or with Igor, can belooked upon as high points in the developm entof analysis in engineering. W e have becomequite close, and I talk to Igor quite a bit. I reallyadm ire what he is trying to do.I look up to Vit Bertero. I mean, here is a manwho is so profoundly involved in engineeringthat I would call him one of th e giants in th efield, and he certainly has been recognized assuch. I think th e only problem with Vitelmo isthat he can wear ou t normal people with th eintensity of interest th at he has in engineering!Another person th at influenced me, interest-ingly enough, is Fritz Mathiesen. W ha t hap-pened th ere is that he is the one who so rt ofdragged me, kicking and screaming, ont o theSEA OC Seismology Com mittee, and in doingso, I ended up with a profound respect forMathiesen. I think th at his early death was agreat loss for th e profession. I think he was oneof the people who could succeed in puttingtechnical issues in term s tha t people such as mecan understand.Mike Preg noff was, of course, fascinating towatch at the Seismology Com mitte e, and Idont think he missed very many m eetings.W ha t was likeable about him is that he was sostraightforward about everything. H e had hisopinion and h e stated it strongly, frequently,and very convincingly.

L et m e see wh o else I can think of-well,recently with my involvement with Caltrans, Ihave become extremely impressed by BruceBolt and I think again, that he is the kind ofperson who is way ahead of a lot of people inhis field and h e has been extremely articulate inmaking his positions understandable.Thats a very brief summ ary of people that I canthink of right now that I have been influencedby, but I should nor only talk about the greats,but also talk abo ut t he people less well known.I think, as I said earlier, Alexande r Tarics wasquite an influence o n me, but that was, ofcourse, durin g m y early stage of development. Ishouldnt leave out m y partn er Eric Elsesser,whom I greatly respect. H e is an extremely cre-ative person and works very quickly in thinkingthings through. H e also has been extremelysuccessful in stradd ling th e two major aspectsof engineering nowadays: th e design of build-ings or the concep tual design of buildings, aswell as marketing and g etting work in, which isvery im portant.I should also mention some mem bers of thepeer review panel for th e San Francisco free-ways. On e person on th at com mittee was a veryold and dear friend of mine, Ep h Hirsch , whomI respect greatly. H e is direct, able to com e tothe point, and no t afraid to speak up. O fcourse, I should no t leave ou t Joe Nicoletti,who obviously ran things with great finesse.Nicolem: Th ank you, Nick!CodesNicoletti: T h e academics seem to be influ-encing code development. Mo re and more ofour codes, I think, are really com ing ou t of the

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academic field. Ou t of research don e by univer-sities. D o you think this is a good thing o r is it abad thing?Forell:being done is extremely beneficial. T h a t it isappe aring in the codes is unfortu nate and itsreally no t because of th e desires of the acade-micians such as Bertero and othe rs, but itsreally because the peop le who w rite t he[SEAOC] Blue Book are th e ones who reallywant it in. I think they are mistaken, in thatthey are creating m ore an d mo re complexitiesin th e codes. I wonder really, as I have saidbefore, how m any people really understand th eprovisions that are now slipping into t he codes?I think when you get to b e my age, you have areal problem with keeping up with the latestcode developments and I thin k its almostimpossible to run a fairly large office and con-tinue to be really very proficient in the latestanalysis processes and co m puter programs. M yposition always has been t o hire people wh o aresmarter than I am. B ecause, if they are n ot,whats the p oint of hiring t he m ?In m y opinion, what is importa nt, even if youarent technically as proficient as your employ-ees, is to really look at their w ork from a verypractical point of view to see if it makes senseor not. If you feel tha t there

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7-Nicholas F Forell