John W. Morris
A:
I'd say percent of all types of construction was Air Force. Leonard Wood was a big program,
Leavenworth and Riley. There were projects at
but most of the Army posts were fairly
each of those but nothing significant. Mostly housing.
The Army ammunition plant program was big. Also, we were building the only Sentinel site at
North Dakota. That complex project was being managed out of Huntsville. General Rip
Young was in charge and George Rebh was his deputy. They had the responsibility for the
technical requirements and MRD had to do some of the contract management. It was a little bit
awkward but we worked it out okay. Similarly with the ammunition plants, rehabilitation.
Q: Just one follow-up. This may have happened more at the district level, but in response to NEPA,
did the internal organization of Corps offices change? Did it bring in more specialists from
different areas?
A
Yes, we salted them with geologists and environmental people. We changed or supplemented the
disciplines. That's how it was done. That's the point I was trying to make before.
The Missouri River Division job turned out to be a very exciting assignment. A turning point in
many Corps activities might have evolved from the way the Missouri River adjusted its staff and
applied its capabilities to new environmental requirements. I don't want to overstate it. I guess
any division engineer would have felt the same way, but that's the way I feel about it. The
assignment proved invaluable in dealing with what lay ahead.
Q:
What impact did the MRD assignment have on your career?
A:
It served as an excellent method of reshaping my thinking from the combat situation in Vietnam
and all that entailed, into the reality of the environmental program in the United States, which was
an infant when I arrived in Omaha. Much of the entire tour there was consumed, more or less, by
trying to get up to speed on what the National Environmental Policy Act really meant-not only
in the civil works program but also in the military program, which included cleaning up
ammunition plants, converting heating systems at major installations, and the normal
construction.
To digress a moment, Mr. Wendell Johnson had been the chief engineer in the Omaha District
and later the Missouri River Division. Wendell Johnson ultimately came to Washington. He was
a truly outstanding engineer, not only for the Corps but for the country.
As I was heading to Omaha, Wendell said, "Here are a couple of people that you might want to
meet." One was Chuck Durham of HDR [Henderson, Durham and Richardson]. That was a very
good association. Another was Leo Daly, Sr. Both fit into some later events. For example, a few
years later Durham wanted someone to help with their big project at Jidda Air Base over in Saudi
Arabia, so he wanted to know about Pendergast. I told him if he wanted somebody to put out on
the end of the line that would do what he was told to do but didn't need a lot of supervision, it'd
be Pendergast. If he wanted to bring him into the office, that'd be another matter. So he hired
Pendergast.
Back to Daly. Later on, Leo Daly had the big job in Saudi Arabia to design the National Guard
headquarters. Mr. Daly nominated me as an honorary member of the American Institute of
Architects. Then there was Peter Kewitt, founder of Kewitt Construction and just an outstanding
person. As in Tulsa, I met a lot of people who were very nice to me and our family and have
remained associates over the years.
I loved the country, the area. There aren't many things in the Corps any more impressive than the
six dams on the Missouri River. I remember telling Pat Pendergast about Clark Hill Dam in
Previous Page
