George Walker - BE, ME, PhD
George didn't grow up dreaming of being an engineer - in fact, it wasn't until his third year of study that he began to understand what civil engineers really did!
George's father wanted his son to have a trade to fall back on in tough times, so he asked his son to think about a vocation. After reading a vocational guidance book in the school library, the farmer's son decided that only one job had any appeal - civil engineering, a job 'for those who are good at mathematics and science and enjoy working outdoors'.
George had some hurdles to overcome - but with encouragement from his principal, sacrifices from his parents, and a final year of schooling at Mt Albert Grammar, he enrolled for civil engineering at Auckland in 1956, and made it to Ardmore as the 1st Pro Class of 1957.
George's strongest memories of his time at Ardmore are of a group of young men - there were no women in engineering in those days - working towards a common goal, living together in somewhat spartan circumstances, and somewhat isolated from the rest of the world, with a great amount of freedom to set their own parameters for group behaviour.
George stayed on at Ardmore after he obtained his BE, to do first an ME in hydraulics on the subject of turbulence, and then a PhD in earthquake engineering. When he graduated in 1966, he became the first person to be awarded a PhD in earthquake engineering from a New Zealand university.
After his PhD, George spent a short time working in Auckland for Prestressed Concerte (NZ) Ltd and since then has worked overseas - first with The Nuclear Power Group, based near Knutsford in northern England; and later teaching design at the James Cook University of North Queensland. The latter position later saw George head the Australian government's investigation into Cyclone Tracy in early 1975.
George later moved to Sydney to take up the position of Assistant Chief of the CSIRO Division of Building Construction and Engineering, in charge of the Division's North Ryde laboratory. For the last 9 years he has worked in the reinsurance industry as a financial engineer and expert in modelling catastrophe insurance losses.
Along the way George married, had two children, and is now a grandfather. In the earlier part of his life church activities took up much of his spare time - but these days he spends his leisure time running - the City to Surf and Sydney half marathon were his annual big events - and singing in a barbershop chorus. He recently moved to Queensland where he now works primarily from home on a 60% part time basis.
