Keith Jacobson, the 2005 Roebling Award winner, delivered the Roebling Lecture in January 2006 at CI’s Regional Seminar in Los Angeles. Below is the first part of his speech. Download the entire lecture here.
Introduction
When Marvin Oey formally notified me of my selection to receive this award and advised me that it is customary and expected that the recipient deliver the Roebling Lecture, I was spellbound; first for having received such recognition, and second by the requirement to deliver the Roebling Lecture.
Because it has been 200 years since John Roebling’s birth, Marvin’s instructions further suggested that topics being considered for this lecture included John A. Roebling’s development as a civil engineer, his projects, his influence on other civil engineers and civil engineering, and the Roebling family legacy. As I reflected upon the enormity of the challenge, as well as the vastness of the topic, I centered on a single thought, “What was it about John A. Roebling’s life and career that continues to influence us, as Construction Engineers today?”
John Roebling’s life and career is well documented and the results of his engineering accomplishments are still with us today. In reviewing his life, career and accomplishments five key areas stand out that are still appropriate to consider in our lives, careers and accomplishments as Construction Engineers today.
The five are heritage, education, passion, proportion and legacy. By reflection on these five elements in our lives we, like John A. Roebling, will continue to influence the next generation of Construction Engineers. Reflections and applications from John
Roebling’s life:
First, Heritage (something you are born to and influenced by)
John Augustus Roebling was born in Muhlhausen, Germany (Prussia) in 1806 to Christoph Polycarpus Roebling and Friedericke Dorothea Roebling. John was the youngest of five children.
He was born and raised in a world of unrest and a period of Napoleonic influence. He grew up in a time where the older students put on uniforms, shouldered muskets, and marched off to stop Napoleon and his army. In spite of this unrest, he enjoyed music and was accomplished in the flute and piano. He developed an artistic talent at an early age. He also built a model bridge that was similar to his ultimate engineering/construction creation: -- the Brooklyn Bridge.
John Roebling was not born to privilege, wealth or position, but to a lower middle class family. His father was a tobacco vender and his mother an ambitious, grimly determined, culturally stagnant housewife. John’s father was lethargic and content with his station in life. He was comfortable puffing his pipe, looking over the medieval architecture of the city, enjoying a beer, entertaining customers and seemingly at peace. John’s mother, Friedericke was radically different. She was five years older than John’s father, impatient, discontented and rebellious to her dull nonprogressive status quo existence. She was alert, ambitious and determined to break out of complacent provincialism and poverty, if not for herself then for her youngest son. It was in her youngest son John, in whom she saw her own nervous energy, quick intelligence and active brain, that she focused her ambition.
John would have all the opportunities she dreamed of. As a result she was the catalyst and compulsion for creating opportunity for John. She toiled unceasingly; she worked and slaved, scrimped and scraped, patched and mended, fasted and denied herself to earn and save every phenning to afford opportunity for John.
John Roebling, in spite of his humble origin, had two significant things which became his heritage that we should take to heart.
First, he was the product of the union of his Mother and Father. Genetically he had the heart and soul of his parents; good and bad. Second, he had a mother who saw his potential and who did whatever she could to guide her son and create opportunity for him to be everything he was capable of becoming, not knowing what that might be.
The lethargy and indifference of John’s father and the dogged determination of John’s mother left no room for loving compassion and encouragement. Yet, John was not the victim of his circumstances; he was the product of those circumstances.
Lessons for us to reflect upon regarding Heritage:
We each are the product of our parents, good and bad. We need to reflect upon that heritage to understand our true potential as well as our weaknesses. We should be constantly thankful for the opportunities created for us by the sacrifices of our parents. Sacrifices which we may have never seen or we are yet to fully appreciate.
I am in the fall of my life and winter of my career. I essentially ran away from home to pursue my career in construction, without maintaining close ties with my own family. It is only now, as I have been near my spent and ailing parents, that I am rekindling my appreciation for the unique individuals they are and sacrifices they made to create opportunity for me. Every morning as I look in the mirror to shave I see in me both the good and bad of my parents and yet I am thankful for who I have become because of them.
Second, Education (something we gain through study and experience)
John Roebling attended the public schools of the Gymnasium in Muhlhausen (at the age of 14, John passed the examination for the title of Master Builder or “Baumeister”). Through John’s mother’s sacrifices and his uncommon intellect, John secured enrollment in the Royal Polytechnic Institute in Berlin where he studied architecture and engineering, bridge and foundation construction, hydraulics, and philosophy graduating in 1826 with a degree in Civil Engineering.
John studied engineering and construction under the best instructors of the time. He studied philosophy under the famous German philosopher Georg Hegel. John became Hegel’s protégé as well as friend. To understand the influence and impact Georg Hegel had upon John Roebling we need to understand a little about Georg Hegel.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, (1770-1831), was a German philosopher, teacher and deep thinker. He was born in Stuttgart and received his education in the seminary of the Protestant Church in Wurttemberg.
Drawing from his religious convictions, he believed that the universe was not random but directed. He believed that this direction was God’s Will and that Will was represented in the world by Man’s reason. He believed that Man’s reason was unlimited because it came from God. This faith in man’s reason was derived from faith in God and this faith influenced his whole work. Hegel first introduced the idea that History and the concrete are important for getting out of the perennial problems of philosophy.
He understood that “cause and effect” are progressive and that when channeled correctly they would result in true progress, understanding and freedom -- approximating the will of God. He introduced a system of understanding the history of philosophy and the world itself, as a progression in which each successive movement of history emerges as a solution to contradictions in the preceding movement.
As an example, for Hegel, the French Revolution constituted the introduction of real freedom into western societies. Yet, this hard won freedom was ultimately consumed by the brutal Reign of Terror. History, however, progresses by learning from its mistakes, resulting in the existence of a constitutional state of free citizens embodying both rational government and ideals of freedom and equality.
For Hegel, freedom was found in the state, but that individual interests must be reconciled with that collective freedom. That is, true freedom is found not only in the state but in self as well. Hegel speculated that the absolute expression of freedom would not be realized in nineteenth century Europe. Prophetically he wrote: “America is therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that lie before us, the burden of the World’s History shall reveal itself.”
It is no wonder that the companionship, teaching and friendship of Georg Hegel had a profound influence upon John Roebling. This influence evidenced itself in the capacity and ability to take the essential engineering theories and principles combined with the understanding of man’s purpose and capacity to reason, to produce what history has shown to be the most influential engineering and construction accomplishments of its time.
John learned to think logically and clearly and to see himself in the foreground of eternity and thereby to rely upon the validity of his own reasoning and conclusions. It was George Hegel’s understanding of true freedom contrasted with the political situation in Europe and the prophetic understanding of the future place of America in world history that influenced John Roebling to emigrate to America.
Following his graduation John was obligated to give three years service to the state, which he spent on road construction in Westphalia. It was not long before the general unrest in Europe, the loss of democratic government to authoritarian governments, combined with the absence of economic mobility and career advancement, caused John unrest and with his brother, Karl, and friends he determined to emigrate to America.
So, in 1831, John, his brother and a handful of friends made the eleven week crossing of the Atlantic to establish a farming settlement and home in what became known as Saxonburg, Pennsylvania. John was a poor farmer and it did not hold his interest for long. He did, however, support the community he established for six years before he felt the freedom to pursue his life quest and passion – he had to build bridges!
Lessons for us to reflect upon regarding Education:
What part of your life’s experience has most shaped you to be who you are today? Who has been the most influential person to shape your understanding of yourself and your place in the foreground of eternity today?
When I was growing up a man who would later become my father-in law had the greatest influence upon shaping who I am today.
He was a small man and a Pearl Harbor survivor who feared nothing and no man. His contribution to my life was his constant reinforcement and encouragement of my natural intellect, talents and latent strengths. He championed me before any one who would listen and he never allowed me to see myself in a negative light. He taught me that whether you are right or wrong it is the way you say something that influences people. I have endeavored to exercise the right side of that equation.
My father and father-in-law because of their character and service in World War Two convinced me of the greatness of this country. We now live in a time when too many citizens are complacent about that greatness. How important do you see the place of America in the history of the world?
Construction Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers