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In Memory of Murray Lount
By Dick Birley

I remember my first glimpse of Murray. It was in Victoria, 1992, a hot July day, about 11:30 in the morning. As I looked out my ground floor office window, I watched an old Ford Mustang turn off the main road and trundle up the long panhandle driveway into the parking lot out front. A distinguished gentleman - mid-sixties, dark blue suit, white shirt, striped tie - unfolded himself from the car and stood there, clutching under his arm a worn zippered leather folder.

Murray had called me the day before from Vancouver and asked if I would collaborate with him to write a software program for detailing rebar. “I asked around about a good rebar detailer,” he said, “and I was told you were the best.” Years later he once advised me that a first introduction should always include a bit of flattery, so after that I was never certain what he had really heard about me. He had asked for a one-hour meeting. I suggested lunch at a nearby restaurant. Six hours later, after lunch, countless cups of coffee, and then dinner, we concluded our meeting and in the process cemented a friendship and business partnership that was to last for nearly fourteen years.

We were, indeed, the most unlikely pair to succeed at anything. No matter what the issue, whether it was politics, religion, business, or science, we were nearly always poles apart. He was at the North Pole of Earth; I was at the South Pole of Mars. Yet we did succeed, based on honesty, mutual respect, and a profound sense of fair play. Murray had high-risk assessment and low risk tolerance. I, on the other hand have low risk assessment and high-risk tolerance. We tempered each other’s positions and I suppose this also contributed to our success.

He was a private man and never spoke at length about his life. However, he related many vignettes of his youth and career, and from these I was able to piece together a probably very incomplete picture of his life but a picture nevertheless. Murray’s father was a talented mechanical engineer who worked in Toronto for Massey-Harris, the large Canadian farm implement manufacturer. In May of 1926, the company sent him to France to take over their troubled operations there. Murray was nine months old. Murray grew up in France and received and excellent elementary education at a very strict but thorough Jesuit school. Murray was completely bi-lingual. I once asked him which was his mother tongue, English or French? He had never thought about it before, and realized at that moment that both languages were his mother tongue. The Jesuits instilled in Murray a disciplined academic approach to all things. Murray accompanied his father as he traveled around France talking with farmers who used the Company’s equipment. He learned from his father how to gather information about problems and how to think creatively to solve those problems. I believe his mother, on the other hand, imbued Murray by rote with many habits and ideas that became part of his character and were unchangeable. I remember the time in the lunchroom I watched Murray set out on the table a plate, knife, fork, spoon, teacup and saucer, and a napkin, then take out of a brown paper bag the ham sandwich he had brought from home for lunch. He was a man of interesting contrasts.

I believe that when Murray was about twelve or thirteen, he was sent off to school in England. This very exclusive private school (“public” school if you are British) had a long waiting list for enrollment. Families would put their sons’ names on the list as soon as they were born. Murray’s father learned that when the school received its charter in the 1700’s, I believe, there was a provision that the school must enroll two students each year from the “colonies”. His father applied under this provision and Murray was in. Shortly after the outbreak of WWII, Murray was sent to Canada. I believe he completed his high school education at University of Toronto, and continued on there to receive his degree in civil engineering. His parents fled France literally hours ahead of the German advance, landed in England, and then returned to Canada. I don’t know a lot about Murray’s career after university, except that the most notable job he spoke about was with Ontario Hydro. I remember a couple of interesting vignettes about his time there. After the war Ontario Hydro purchased an enormous amount of war surplus “Bailey Bridges”. These were the ingeniously simple, prefabricated components that could be quickly assembled into bridges on site that enabled the Allies to advance so quickly across Europe during the rout of the German army. Hydro’s idea was to use these bridges on temporary roads built during the construction of new dams, power plants and power lines. However, Murray’s creative mind proposed that these bridge components might also be used as “walers” to support the forms for mass concrete used in the power plants and dams. Hydro sent Murray to England to do a feasibility study with Sir John Bailey, inventor of the “Bailey Bridge”. This was a notable event in the fledgling career of a 26-year-old engineer.

Some time later, one of these temporary bridges collapsed resulting in a serious loss of equipment, and if I remember correctly, loss of life. Murray, as the designer of the bridge, was immediately presumed to be responsible. Fortunately, he had long before earned the highest respect from his immediate supervisors who vouched for his competence. With that, and with his keen forensic analysis and attention to minute detail, Murray was able to prove beyond a doubt that the failure was due to the construction team taking shortcuts in erecting the bridge. They did not follow the erection procedure that Murray had clearly outlined. Murray’s boss was so impressed that he immediately put Murray in charge of inspecting all work done by the bridge construction crews.

In the 1950’s while still with Hydro Murray began working with computers. Thus began his lifelong affection with a new technology that he was positive would revolutionize engineering design and change the world. Over the next fifty years he would explore every new advance in computer technology and advance new technology on his own. He collaborated with experts in the computer technology field from all over the world. He delivered many papers and made presentations at international conferences. More than thirty years ago he envisioned a new way for computers to handle data that would make possible the ability for disparate computer systems to communicate with each other. He was far ahead of his time. While he had the vision, it took technology another twenty-five years to reach a level at which he could begin to truly achieve his dream. For the past ten years, Murray has been working at the development of that dream. I believe he was within a couple of years of reaching his goal.

Murray was an innovator in more than just computer technology. He followed the work of Eugène Freyssinet, a French engineer who developed a post tensioning system for precast segmental bridges know as the Freyssinet System. Murray went to France, studied the system, and designed the first structure in North America using this technique, a large railway overpass in Ontario. (Unfortunately, a small pedestrian overpass that was started after Murray’s project began but completed sooner holds the honor for the first such structure completed in North America.) He spent many years developing computer aided design systems to enhance this type of design. Murray went on to design over 150 bridges using this technique, and was considered an expert in the field.

One day, years ago, Murray got a call from a prominent New York architect. “I’m designing an S-shaped pier”, he said, “and I have been told by several engineers that the Freyssinet System cannot be used on curved structures. What do you think?” Murray replied that he thought it probably could be used but it would take a lot of calculating and creative thinking. This was the beginning of series of meetings that culminated in a design commission with Frank Lloyd Wright.

Murray was a member of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of British Columbia (APEGBC), a life member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), and a Fellow of the American Concrete Institute (FACI) where he was a member for fifty years. He was the founding chairman of the Committee 118 – Use of Computers, and wrote the section in the ACI Detailing Manual dealing with computer detailing. He worked on large projects in Somalia, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Louisiana.

Murray and I started Condor Rebar Consultants Inc in 1992. We used the profits from our rebar detailing operation to create our software called Condor Rebar Detailing System (CRDS) and then expand it into Condor Rebar Management System (CRMS). In 2003, Murray asked me to buy his shares in Condor Rebar Consultants. We left the detailing operation in Condor Rebar and spun out the software development operation into Condor Software Inc, which we continued to own jointly. Condor Software completed and enhanced CRMS, and with assistance of grants from the National Research Council began the object-oriented graphics system that we are currently developing.

I remember my last glimpse of Murray. It was February 16, about 3:00 in the afternoon. Murray had dropped into my office to discuss a few details about the progress of our research. We then talked about his upcoming trip to Mexico. He said he was tired and eagerly looking forward to the vacation. He rose from his chair with difficulty. While the years since we met had clearly taken their toll, now that I knew him so well he appeared an even more distinguished gentleman than the fellow I first glimpsed so many years ago. We shook hands, said goodbye, and he walked out of my office clutching that same worn zippered leather folder he held when we first met. That, sadly, was the last glimpse I had of my dear friend and colleague. I miss him dearly. We all will.

Dick Birley