Honoring Lymon C. Reese
Lymon C. Reese
Lymon C. Reese, Nasser I. Al-Rashid Chair Emeritus in Civil Engineering, passed away on September 14, 2009 at the age of 92.
Dr. Reese served in the US Navy during World War II and attended college on the G.I. Bill. He earned his B.S. and M.S. degrees from UT in 1949 and 1950, and his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley in 1955. He joined the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin in 1955.
Dr. Reese served as Chair of the Department of Civil Engineering from 1965 to 1972 and as Associate Dean for Program Planning in the College of Engineering from 1972 to 1979. He continued to teach classes in the Department until 1993 and supervised more than 70 graduate students during his career. Dr. Reese’s research and teaching focused on geotechnical engineering. His pioneering work on field studies of instrumented piles led to the development of analytical methods for the design of deep foundations that have been used to design major structures around the world.
Among his many honors, Dr. Reese was elected into the National Academy of Engineering in 1975 and received the Karl Terzaghi Award from the American Society of Civil Engineers in 1983. He was a Distinguished Graduate of the College of Engineering at the University of Texas and a member of the Academy of Distinguished Alumni in the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering.
Dr. Reese influenced the lives of thousands of students over the course of his career. He will be sincerely missed.
Gifts in honor of Dr. Reese may be made to the University of Texas at Austin in support of the Lyman and Eva Lee Reese Endowed Excellence Fund in Geotechnical Engineering. Please direct donations to UT Cockrell School of Engineering, 1 University Station C2100, Austin, TX 78712 or online.