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When the talk turns to Karl von Terzaghi, Dietmar Adam, head of the foundation engineering, soil and rock mechanics research area and head of the Institute for Geotechnics at the Vienna University of Technology, is impressed by his technical work. "No matter where you go internationally, as a Viennese you will be addressed in Terzaghi." No wonder, since Terzaghi founded the institute that Adam directs as his fourth successor and founded modern soil mechanics in the practical and theoretical areas.
Terzaghi, like many famous personalities associated with Vienna, was not a native Viennese. Karl was born on October 2, 1883 in Prague, and soon afterwards the family moved to Graz. When his father died, his grandfather became his guardian. He wanted his grandson to be an “energetic, old-school engineer,” said Terzaghi in his autobiography. Grandpa Terzaghi (studied technology in Vienna) was a role model. "His strong, clear personality and his upright, masculine character influenced my development into mature manhood."
At the age of ten, Karl went to the military secondary school in Güns (today Kőszeg in Hungary). A lecture by the polar explorer Julius von Payer (1841 to 1915) left a deep impression here. After graduating from high school (1900) in Graz, he studied mechanical engineering for a few semesters at the Technical University (now TU-Graz), which he pursued with not too much ambition. Rather, he was fascinated by geological topics at the University of Graz. The hydraulic engineer Philipp Forchheimer (1852 to 1933) and the technician Ferdinand Wittenbauer (1857 to 1922), who is also known as a poet and playwright, were influential in Graz. The latter became his “role model in the area of life design”. Terzaghi earned his first money as a mechanical engineer in Graz Andritz, but realized that he "wouldn't find any satisfaction" in the field. Rather, he was fascinated by geology. During his military service he practiced translating Sir Archibald Geikie's (1835 to 1924) "Outlines of Field-Geology", which was published as a "Guide to Geological Surveys" in 1906.
The next stop was Vienna. "In the fall of 1906 I joined the concrete construction company Adolf Baron Pittel in Vienna as a project engineer" (today: Pittel+Brausewetter). Terzaghi quickly learned the necessary technical know-how from older colleagues. He undoubtedly recognized the importance of the geological subsoil in buildings. "Almost all technical difficulties, accidents and miscalculations within the company's sphere of influence were ultimately due to geological circumstances, the technical impact of which had not been recognized at all or had been recognized too late." Unexpected ground settlement or difficulties with foundation work made Terzaghi decide to focus his work on researching the border area between geology and construction. This was, without the name being mentioned, the birth of soil mechanics. A much-needed discipline at the interface between civil engineers and geologists.
His next project took him to Transylvania. Here he learned the “beginning principles of practical construction” through his own “mistakes”. In other words: learning by doing. Projects followed in Lower Austria before he went to Croatia in the fall of 1909, where the aim was to build a hydroelectric power station. In the karst he explored the true nature of the poles, large underground cavities. He recognized them as solution phenomena ("Chemical Denudation", 1913).
As challenging as the previous projects were, Terzaghi wanted to cover the entire spectrum of civil engineering. Before he moved to the land of unlimited opportunities, the USA, where large irrigation systems were being built at the time, he stopped off in Russia and the Baltics (Riga). In St. Petersburg there were problems with the construction of a bank building on alluvial land, which was riddled with layers of bog and mud. A new challenge – just right for the aspiring engineer. Almost at the last minute before the trip across the Atlantic in February 1911, he acquired his doctorate in Graz in January 1911.
From 1916 to 1925 he followed a call to Turkey to Constantinople (now Istanbul) to the Robert College there, an American high school founded in 1863, where he carried out experiments using the simplest means. "The inventory of my laboratory consisted only of empty cigar boxes, the university's kitchen scales, an old apothecary scale that I had bought in the Stambul bazaar, and some steel straps." Terzaghi knew how to make a virtue out of necessity and concluded in his autobiography "that success in research does not depend on the perfection of the experimental facilities, but on the truthfulness of the guiding principles." Terzaghi had now gathered enough information. In 1925 his fundamental book “Earth construction mechanics based on soil physics” was published, which ultimately founded modern soil mechanics. The years 1925 to 1929 would take him to the USA again.
At the beginning of October 1929 he returned to the Old World and accepted a call to the Technical University in Vienna. He summarized his time in America: "Interest in the problems of soil mechanics has been awakened by word and writing throughout the American professional community." On the other side of the Atlantic he impressed with his work. In 1930, the American Society of Civil Engineers awarded him its highest honor: the Norman Medal. Terzaghi was to receive this medal three more times: 1942, 1946 and 1955 - there was never another quadruple honor.
In Vienna, Terzaghi began building an earthworks laboratory in the basement of the Technical University on Karlsplatz. Thanks to his mechanical engineering studies in Graz, he was able to build the necessary apparatus himself. Arthur Casagrande (1902 to 1981), Terzaghi's close colleague, sees the years in Vienna as the most important. "There is no question that during the nine years from 1929 to 1938, Vienna rapidly became the leading center for soil mechanics in the world."
The construction work on the Reich Bridge over the Danube also took place during this era. Terzaghi was responsible for the foundation of the 373 meter long suspension bridge; the biggest challenge was the abutments (anchor blocks) that were used to tension the cables. In May 1933 he prepared a report together with Casagrande. The basis for this was test arrangements, sometimes over several months, on samples from boreholes. Terzaghi's work and theses led to controversy with his colleague of the same age, Paul Fillunger. While there were initially polemical publications from both sides, an investigative commission set up by the Rectorate ultimately concluded that Terzaghi had nothing to blame. But before the result was available, the controversy took a dramatic turn on March 7, 1937. "Suicide of Prof. Fillunger and his wife," was the headline in the "Neue Freie Presse" the next day and the text continued: "Professor Fillunger, who had been an academic teacher at the Vienna Technical University for fifteen years, took this dispute, which ultimately ended in favor of his academic opponent, to heart so much that he even resorted to suicide."
When the Reichsbrücke collapsed on August 1, 1976, Emeritus Heinz Brandl, Adam's predecessor, made it clear that the collapse was unforeseeable and "was in no way related to any failure of the foundation designed by K. Terzaghi." Rather, the cause was the yielding of a bridge pier due to overstressing of the concrete contact area.
In the spring of 1938, Terzaghi sought release from his employment at the Technical University; his destination was the United States, the home of his second wife. From 1939 he taught soil mechanics at Harvard University in Massachusetts. In the next decades he was extremely active and successful internationally. Among other things, he was chairman of the advisory board for the construction of the Aswan Dam in Egypt, which began in 1960. Terzaghi received no fewer than nine honorary doctorates.
Terzaghi's attitude to the Nazi regime can be seen in a letter from the USA (Cambridge / Massachusetts) dated November 24, 1938 to the rectorate of the Technical University: "As a result of my open preference for the ethnically inclined part of the academic youth, I had to forego any support for my teaching chair from the old government for years." There is no known NS membership, according to Paulus Ebner, archivist at the Vienna University of Technology. Richard E. Goodman, who wrote the English-language biography of Terzaghi, quoted him as follows (p. 168): "The Fatherland denoted me as a Nazi, the Nazis as a Bolshevik, and the Bolsheviks as a conservative idealist. Certainly only one of the three could be right, and that one is the Bolsheviks." Seen in this light, Terzaghi, who had experienced several political regimes, saw himself as a conservative idealist.
Regardless of this, in 1966, three years after his death on October 25, 1963, an alley in Vienna-Donaustadt was named after him. As part of the project "Street names in Vienna since 1860 as 'political places of remembrance'", Terzaghigasse was placed in the category "Cases with biographical gaps relevant to democratic politics". The original version of the study states: "For a critical assessment of Terzaghi - especially his connections to the Nazi regime during the Second World War - further research is necessary."
In 1967, lecture hall 16 (Karlsplatz 13, main building, staircase I, 3rd floor) at the Technical University was renamed Karl von Terzaghi Lecture Hall. His assistant, Arthur Casagrande, donated a bronze bust of Terzaghi. But today the Terzaghi lecture hall no longer exists at the TU Vienna.
In 1983, on the occasion of his 100th birthday, a special stamp (value: 3 schillings) was issued by the Austrian Post, the design was by Adalbert Pilch. The Reichsbrücke in Vienna, which opened in 1937, is on the first day envelope.
In memory of Terzaghi's scientific achievements, a Terzaghi archive is currently being set up on the premises of the TU Vienna. The opening is planned for 2026 on the occasion of the 21st International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnics at the Austria Center in Vienna. The occasion is the 100th anniversary of Terzaghi's classic "Earth construction mechanics based on soil physics". (Thomas Hofmann, May 13, 2024)