Karl S. Pister

Dr. Karl Pister receiving the Berkeley Medal 1996

Karl Stark Pister was born June 27, 1925, in Stockton, California. He graduated from Stockton High School as class valedictorian in 1942, and from University of California, Berkeley with a BS in Civil Engineering in 1945. After a short stint in the Naval Reserve and an assignment to Okinawa, Japan, during World War II, he commenced studies at Berkeley during the fall of 1946, and graduated with an MS in Civil Engineering in 1948. This was followed by a PhD in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1952.

When Pister was hired at UC Berkeley in 1952, he initially con- ducted research on material properties of Portland Cement Concrete and the behavior of torpedo nets. For this early research work, he received the Wason Medal for Research, awarded by the American Concrete Institute. During the late 1950s he also began a multi-decade association with Lawrence Livermore National Labs.

Over the next two decades, he served as Vice-chair of the Civil Engineering Department (1964–65), Chairman of the Division of Structural Engineering and Structural Mechanics (1970–71), Chairman of Committee on Educational Policy at Berkeley (1972–73), Senate Policy chair and Academic Senate, Berkeley Division, vice chair (1976–78), and Vice chairman and chairman of the nine-campus Academic Council and Assembly of the Academic Senate (1978–1980).

Pister was appointed Dean of the College of Engineering in 1980, a position he held for ten years. From 1985 to 1990, he was the first holder of the Roy W. Carlson Chair in Engineering. From 1991–1996 he served as Chancellor, UC Santa Cruz. He then returned to Berkeley to work as Vice President for Educational Outreach in the UC Office of the President (1999–2000) and to chair the task force on upgrading California Memorial Stadium (2004–2012). Throughout these many roles, he is well known and respected for leading by example, and his passionate commitment to promoting social justice.

The American Society for Engineering Education presented him with the Vincent Bendix Award for Minorities in Engineering, and the Lamme Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the society, for his contributions to engineering education. He is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Mechanics, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and an Honorary Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences.

Pister is a member of the National Academy of Engineering (1980) and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the recipient of the Berkeley Medal (1996) and the Presidential Medal of the University of California (2000). In 2006, The California Alumni Association named him Cal Alumnus of the Year.

Karl Pister married Rita Olsen in 1950. They have four daughters and two sons.

Dr. Mark Austin
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
University of Maryland at College Park
austin@umd.edu
Website: http://www.isr.umd.edu/∼austin (Internet archived on 2021.07.20)

CMES Special Issue

Celebrating the 95th birthday of Professor Karl S. Pister

On the occasion of Professor Pister’s 95th birthday and his long academic career–-in research, teaching, and university leadership and administration–-we gathered together former students, friends and colleagues to contribute to a CMES Special Issue, Vol.129, No.3, 2021 Nov 25, which is composed of three parts.

Part 1 consists of eighteen items, a biography of Professor Pister followed by seventeen individual tributes to Professor Pister. Part 2 consists of fourteen technical papers dedicated to Professor Pister, followed by Part 3, a memory-lane with photos of the participants from way back when, particularly around the time of their closest interaction with Professor Pister, either through research or through administration.

Dr. Sheila Humphreys, 1987

Specifically, we intentionally arranged Part 1 to reflect a certain balance of diversity that Professor Pister sought for much of his later career as a university administrator, as described in detail in the long tribute by Dr. Sheila Humphreys titled “Karl S. Pister and the Foundation of Diversity in Engineering”. It is with regret that the same extent of the balance in Part 1 could not be replicated in Part 2.

We pay particular attention to the permanence of Web resources cited in this special issue. For example, the University of Maryland Office of the President (umd.edu), which would show different UMD presidents depending on when this webpage is accessed many years in the future, is accompanied by the archived, permanent webpage Internet archived on 2021.06.05, which will always display the photo and leadership of UMD President Darryll Pines, an alumnus from the University of California at Berkeley, and a contributor to this special issue. A website could have its address changed, or removed completely in the future, but its Internet archived version remains permanent.

Dr. Darryll J. Pines 2021, President of University of Maryland, College Park

Similarly, as Wikipedia articles constantly continue to evolve, with new information added and errors corrected by many editors (and are sometimes vandalized, but almost always quickly reverted to the previous good version), the version of any Wikipedia article at the time of access in this special issue, such as the article ‘Cesar Chavez’ in connection with the tribute by Ms. Lola Martin-Atilano, is immediately followed by the archived, fixed version closest to the time of writing for this special issue, such as Wikipedia version 19:58, 19 May 2021.

We are well aware of the birthdate of Professor Pister. This special issue was started in 2020 when we underestimated the time it took to put it together with a quality level where it is now. Since many participants were informed of the special issue title, we keep it the same, as the (late) birthday present, and the effort expanded into creating it, would mean more than the actual age in the title. In addition, a mid-decade celebration seems to resonate well.

So Happy Birthday Karl. We wish you continued good health and good spirit.

With our appreciation, gratitude, respect, and very best regards,

Karl Pister Special Issue editors

Loc Vu-Quoc¹ and Shaofan Li² (2021 Nov 25)

¹Aerospace Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL 61801, USA ∙ vql@illinois.edu
²Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California at Berkeley, CA 94720, USA ∙ Shaofan@berkeley.edu

External links

• Karl Pister, former UC Santa Cruz chancellor and UC Berkeley dean, has died, Public Affairs, UC Berkeley, 2022 May 16.
• Karl S. Pister on Wikipedia, where anonymous users can edit.