Douglas C. Moorhouse was the long-time President & CEO of the iconic geotechnical and environmental consulting firm headquartered in the Bay Area, Woodward-Clyde Consultants (WCC). He received his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1950. At Berkeley, he developed an interest in the young discipline of soil mechanics, with Richard J. Woodward, Jr. and Ned P. Clyde, two of the founders of WCC, as his professors. Upon graduation, Mr. Moorhouse worked for four years with the State of California, Division of Highways. In 1954, he joined his former professors at WCC where he remained for the next 38 years, until his retirement. Mr.Moorhouse was born in Oakland, California in February 1926 and he died in March 2012 at the age of 86.
At WCC, Mr. Moorhouse quickly established himself as a top-flight engineer and manager, and a natural leader. From 1954 to 1959, he served as WCC’s Chief Highway Engineer in the firm’s Bay Area office. In 1959, he relocated to San Diego and became Branch Manager of WCC’s office there. In 1962, he moved his family east to bring a WCC presence to the New York-New Jersey metropolitan area, serving until 1973 as President and CEO of the WCC operating company Woodward-Moorhouse & Associates. While in the eastern U.S., he attended the Soil Mechanics Program and the Advanced Business Management Program at Harvard University. In 1973, he and his family returned to the Bay Area where he served in President and CEO positions until 1991. Under his leadership, WCC grew to more than 2,000 employees throughout the U.S. and in both Europe and the Pacific region.
In his professional practice, Mr. Moorhouse had responsibility for the geotechnical aspects in the design and construction of buildings, nuclear and fossil fuel plants, dams, highways, railroads, bridges, tunnels, airports, and water and wastewater treatment systems. Major projects include Aswan Dam (Egypt), the Trans-Alaska pipeline project (Alaska), a new 1,600 km railroad line (Morocco), the Westway Highway project (New York City), and repository siting studies for the Office of Nuclear Waste Isolation for the U.S. Department of Energy.
Throughout his career, he was active in service to the profession. He served as Board President for the Hazardous Waste Action Coalition, as Chair of the ASCE Task Committee on International Competitiveness, on the Planning Cabinet of the American Consulting Engineers Council (ACEC), as a Senior Fellow of the California Council on Science and Technology, and as a Board Director for the University of California, Berkeley Engineering Alumni Society.
Amongst his career awards and recognitions, in 1969, Mr. Moorhouse received the Wesley W. Horner Award from ASCE. In 1972, he received the ACEC Award for Engineering Excellence. In 1982, he was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Engineering.