F. J. Converse; Caltech Soil Mechanics Professor

Frederick J. Converse, whose name became synonymous with soil mechanics and foundations and whose projects over the years included the BART tunnel beneath San Francisco Bay, power plants and dams for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and the Saturn Missile Test Stand for NASA, has died.

The 95-year-old professor emeritus at Caltech, who began teaching at that school in 1921 when it was called Throop Institute of Technology, had retired from teaching in 1962.

At that time Caltech’s president, Lee A. DuBridge, called him “a pioneer in the field of civil engineering (and), an adviser to builders, architects and contractors . . . and a valuable member of the Institute faculty. . . . “

Converse, whose involvement in materials testing dated to World War I when he was chosen to develop a laboratory for the old Bureau of Aircraft Production, came to Los Angeles shortly after that war as an engineer for the former Department of Power and Light.

After moving to Caltech, where he taught applied mechanics and strength of materials, he also became a consultant in the private sector.

Much of his early work was devoted to the aftermath of the Long Beach earthquake of 1933 and the subsequent tightening of structural standards.

After World War II he formed a Pasadena-based consulting firm now known as Converse Consultants Pasadena and worked on literally thousands of projects around the world.

Besides the BART and NASA projects, he was involved in the building of the California Aqueduct, the Terminal Island Naval Base and the piers for a suspension bridge in Lisbon.

Converse, who died Friday, was a former president of the structural engineers’ associations of both California and Southern California and was an honorary member of the American Society of Civil Engineers.

His survivors include two daughters, five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.